Milestones

The last few weeks have been a whirlwind for me. For starters, in late October, I submitted what felt like the 7th copy of my dissertation proposal to my chair. By the 9th of November, the day before my 49th birthday, my chair approved my proposal and sent it to the rest of the committee. I also scheduled my dissertation proposal defense for 12/9. Additionally, I interviewed at Rocky Vista University College of Osteopathic Medicine on 11/9. On 11/23, I got the call from RVUCOM that I'd been offered a seat in the Fall 2021 entering class. I am still at a loss for words. I started this journey to earning a seat in medical school almost 14 years ago and at times, I did not think that I would ever see this day. I also received an admissions offer from Ross University School of Medicine in Barbados on 12/9. Their offer came with a $93,000 academic scholarship and a $16,000 housing scholarship. Finally, I had my third medical school interview on 12/9 with A.T. Still University - School of Osteopathic Medicine, Arizona. SOMA has long been one of my top choices of medical school and the interview went EXCEEDINGLY well. Nothing is ever guaranteed, but I feel as if I will be offered a seat at SOMA and if so, I will have a tough decision to make. RVUCOM is an outstanding medical school and one that I would feel very at home at. SOMA is also an outstanding medical school and its located in my adopted home state of Arizona. Decisions, decisions. As my pop would say, this is a good problem to have... Lastly, I passed my dissertation proposal on 12/9!!! I was very stressed because my SOMA interviews took place all morning and when they ended, I literally had 10 minutes to switch gears and prepare for the proposal defense. Fortunately, I was well prepared and I answered all of my committee members questions and only one minor change was suggested. They want me to switch my theoretical grounding from the Precaution Process Adoption Model (PAPM) to the Transtheoretical Stages of Change Model (TTM). Other than that, I passed my proposal defense and can officially say that I am in the final stage of my Ph.D. studies. My IRB is ready to be submitted and hopefully by January 18th, I can start to collect data. Several weeks of milestones...