Optometry Students:
- Before Starting School
- Study Aids
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You're
waiting for optometry
school...what's
next?
You're all done with
undergrad...and now it's time
to get ready for another four years of schooling. Here are
some tips on some things you
can
do before school starts:
- Are
you a Recent
Graduate and Have Loans? Make
sure you consolidate your
student loans!!! Loan consolidation allows you to lock in your
current
interest rate because historically, the interest rate increases every
year. So the sooner you consolidate your loans, the better. There are a
lot of programs out there that provide student loan
consolidation. Some of those
programs also have incentives to consolidate your loans,
including rate reductions for automatic monthly withdrawals.
- Get
Your Loans
Deferred. Speaking of loans,
while you are attending
optometry school you are eligible for a student loan deferment. Don't
forget
to do this - I caught quite a few people forgetting to defer
their loans so make sure you go to your loan servicer and get the
proper forms signed by your school.
- Take
Care of Your
Finances! During your
time off between graduation and school,
it would be wise to pay off your high interest loans (especially credit
cards). This is true because your financial aid has some
dependency on your credit score. So make sure your credit
score
is good to go before you apply for financial aid. Government
regulations actually allow you to get one free credit report every
year. You can go to www.freecreditreport.com
or www.annualcreditreport.com
- Start
looking for apartments. Here are some ideas
for your search:
- Go
to Google
Maps
then enter the address of your school. After
that, click on "Find businesses" and type in the keyword "apartments".
You can see the different apartment complexes within the
radius
of your school. Here is an example below with SCCO's address
-
just click the
image to enlarge it:
- There
is a site called ApartmentRatings.com
that provides subjective feedback on various apartments nationwide. But
beware of bias - remember that these ratings are
subjective
so always take their opinions with a grain of salt.
- I'm
not so sure of
other schools, but SCCO provides a roommate listing once the
orientation packet comes in the summer. It's basically a list
of
people who submitted their contact info so that they can find
roommates. I would guess that other schools have this service
too, but contact your school's admissions office to find out for sure.
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