Success Stories

Here you will find current and or former APPAS members who have been accepted into at least one PA program. Below they describe their individual and unique journeys to becoming a PA!

Samantha Uliana

“I graduated May 2020 with a degree in Exercise Science. I was accepted to Gardner-Webb University’s PA program and began January 2022. During my time at USC I worked as a personal trainer for campus rec which helped to teach me a lot about professionalism and reinforced my anatomy and physiology knowledge from class. I participated in research with Dr. Moore for two semesters and was also an active member of APPAS. I attended the medical service learning trip to Costa Rica in 2019. I served as president of APPAS my senior year (2020) which was an amazing leadership opportunity and not only taught me a lot about that but also more about teamwork, delegation, responsibility, and the PA process as a whole. For my PCE I worked as a CNA in an assisted living facility for ~4 months and then in an orthopedic hospital for ~8 months. I then began working as a medical scribe in an oncology clinic for HCE until I was accepted into school.”

Megan Fridrich

“My name is Megan Fridrich and I just graduated from UofSC in December 2021. I graduated with a major in Exercise Science and a minor in Health Promotion, Education and Behavior. I submitted my CASPA on June 30th, 2021 and was accepted to Wingate University in North Carolina and the University of South Florida in Tampa! I will be attending the University of South Florida and starting in May! For my PCE I worked as a CNA at Still Hopes in Columbia. I also volunteered in triage for over 200 hours at the Good Samaritan Clinic. These hours were able to count as PCE as I took patients blood pressure, O2 sats, pulse, blood glucose and more. I believe that volunteering at the clinic helped my application a lot and was a topic I talked about in every interview I had. I also was a research assistant for a semester in the Arnold school and did 300 hours in cardiac rehab for my practicum, where I was able to shadow a PA in open heart surgery. APPAS helped me to fully understand how to complete CASPA, as well as educate me on the requirements of different programs. I also really enjoyed listening to all of the speakers. I also found out about the Good Samaritan clinic through APPAS and was able to meet more members through volunteering there! Overall, APPAS gave me the confidence I needed when applying as CASPA felt very overwhelming at first.”

Amanda Saracinello

“I graduated in May 2018 with a degree in Biochemistry & Molecular Biology. I decided to create APPAS in 2017 and served as the founding president from 2017-2018. My goal was to bring together a collaborative community of like-minded pre-PA students determined to lift each other up and make a difference in the healthcare field.
During my time at USC, I also served as a pre-PA student advisor for the Office of Pre-Professional Advising (OPPA) and was an active member of the Capstone Scholars community, where I met (the now retired) Dr. Hickey who helped create APPAS. As a freshman, I joined Dr. Hickey on a medical service trip to Nicaragua and greatly enjoyed serving a rural, underserved population. During my senior year, Dr. Hickey invited me to return to the same community as a group leader with a group of APPAS students for APPAS’s first medical trip.
For my PCE, I began working as an EMT in 2012 and rode as often as I could when I came home to NJ. When I graduated from USC, I began working as a nursing assistant at an NJ hospital on the trauma/spine/ortho unit for 6 months then transferred to the pre-operative unit for another year. Working as an EMT was a great way to build my medical confidence!
By the time I had been accepted to PA school, I had applied in 3 separate application cycles. My first was the summer prior to my senior year. In the summer of 2019, I was finally accepted into my top program: Rutgers PA Program. I began in August 2020 and am now set to graduate in 2023. At the time of writing this, I am about to start my clinical rotations, with my first rotation at New York Presbyterian Weill Cornell campus (a dream of mine since high school)!
Creating APPAS and working alongside so many great students has reminded me of the importance of support systems in building your success. Applying to PA school can be incredibly overwhelming and a support system like APPAS is critical to setting yourself up to achieve your highest potential!”

Danielle Auth

“My name is Danielle Auth and I graduated UofSC in May of 2021 with a bachelors degree in Exercise Science. I submitted my CASPA with all the requirements in the beginning of May 2021 and was accepted to South University of Richmond and Towson CCBC University! I will be entering Towson CCBC’s PA program in May of 2022 and couldn’t be more excited; Towson was my top choice and a great fit for me due to location with in-state tuition and an academically rigorous course load. I was very nervous when I began my PA journey because I switched majors halfway through my college career with no PCE hours but APPAS really helped me focus my outline with prerequisites and gave me awesome opportunities to find volunteer work, PCE jobs, and connections with other link-minded students. Once joining, I gathered most of my volunteer hours working at the Good Samaritan Clinic, the Free Medical Clinic, and medical mission trips through MedLife. I proceeded to work as an MA for a cardiology clinic, a Bariatric clinic, and recently a pediatric clinic where I gathered over 1,200 PCE hours when applying to CASPA. My application stood out in interviews because I highlighted my well-roundedness as a MA in different specialties, my passion as a volunteer for helping underserved communities, and my drive as a executive leader on APPAS and in my sorority. My advice for anyone that is thinking of applying soon or in the future is to always believe in yourself and to work hard for what you want because you can achieve anything you put your mind to - even if you’ve switched majors halfway through college! Very grateful for this organization and I can’t wait to see many more APPAS achieve their dream!”

 If you have been accepted into a PA program, are a current or former member of APPAS, and interested in being featured on this page please reach out to us via Instagram or email :)

last updated: January 25th, 2022