Didactics

This is a no-holds-barred kind of post. Curious about my best application strategy? Sure. How did I become a mod? No problem. WHY DO YOU REMOVE SO MANY OF MY POSTS?! I'll answer that, too.

So, fire away. Just not at me, please.

My program began a week ago and I’m already ridiculously overwhelmed and behind on the material. Every day just feels like more information being added on and I don’t have enough time or brain space to really understand it so I’m just falling more and more behind. I haven’t had more than 30 minutes of dedicated recreational enjoyment since we began. I’ve entirely given up on taking notes during lecture and instead I’m just trying to focus on the material presented but I feel like it’s just hitting my brain and bouncing off and adding to the list of things I have to sit down and chunk through on my own sometime. And later when I try to study I feel like I can’t enter a state of productive studying and I’m just looking at the material without learning it. When I get home I’m just exhausted and feel tired no matter how much I sleep. How am I supposed to be learning this information in a way that I can actually grasp it in an amount of time that won’t keep pushing me further and further behind?

Sorry for the rant, I’m just really stressed and the longer it takes me to get this down the more it piles up.

Should I be striving for that A or just passing lol - I just had my first anatomy exam and I’m pretty sure I got a low B

In your patch-notes you mention that the recent XP-change has been brought about in an attempt to encourage learning, but teaching players who are not currently soaking to do so by leaving a visual reminder (I presume) for them to return at a later point. I assume this has been done with the idea that they will then stop and think: "Aha! We could be getting a lot more XP if we were here on time."

But isn't the opposite actually the case? Doesn't this change actually reinforce these player's bad habits by establishing a meta that rewards you more for skipping a wave or two in order to chase 1 or 2 kills respectively, rather than "wasting your time" soaking full waves, which ultimately rewards less? And does that not in turn encourage a mindset of: "Well, we should deathball to kill the enemy team during their laning phase, because we can always collect 25% of the XP we miss out on at a later point, in addition to the amount of soak the enemy team is being denied + the kills we achieve along the way."?

In fact, have you not actually made it so that rather than teach new people how to soak, the optimal choice is now not to soak, as 1 kill + 25% XP is more valuable than 100% XP from minions + 0 kills?

Sincerely, a former laning specialist who sucks at PvP and has now become obsolete.

Hi. I finish didactic in mid-August, I just need to vent lol I feel burnt out 😞 we started our last semester of didactic 2 weeks ago and I’m excited to finish didactic but I’m so tired. There’s 12 weeks left. I’m just stressed and sad, so I thought I’d make this random post. Studying all the time can be lonely and depressing. Sometimes I just want to wake up and not think of school. Then suffering from imposter syndrome. Got my heart broken last July, just before starting. It was tough but I’m so thankful I made it through because I wasn’t sure I would honestly. Healing, and doing better than before. Idkkkkk I’m currently taking notes so I thought I’d make this post, it’s clearly all over the place lol just a lot of mixed emotions. Happy, stressed, emotional, uncertain. Just trying to pull through. Can anyone else relate to this weird state of mind I’m in rn? 🙁

Essentially, my MLS clinical rotations are in Chicago and the PA school I plan to attend is in North Chicago — which is not in Chicago but rather about 45-60 minutes away from where I will be staying in the city. My lease will run into August of next year but PA school starts late May.

I’m asking this question to kind of get a sense of what my commute will be like for that summer until I can move somewhere a little closer. That being said, PA school clinical year will put me right back into Chicago’s medical district anyways.

How many days a week did you have class? What were the hours like? Did any of you have a lengthy commute? If so, did you find you had enough time to study without getting too burnt out?

Thank you!

I read a post on here about not getting Uworld until clinical year. Are Anki and Rosh the go-to for didactic. I’ve only ever used Quizlet. I’m trying to get an idea of how I’ll break my studies down. I’ve been reading Make It Stick and I really want to try the techniques in there.

(Losing my mind here. Palpitations through the roof.)

I don’t start school until the fall, but I’m trying to find some helpful study tips and apps. I’m a very visual learner! I’ve seen really great things about the app complete anatomy and was just wondering what apps helped you the most? I also realize my program might supply me with some free apps so I don’t plan on purchasing any yet. Just trying to get an idea!

I'm a first year PA student and I saw there's a PA who works in a field I haven't seen any PAs in before. She works for the same hospital system my school is associated with and it's a field I have some experience with during my PCE hours.

Is it acceptable to shadow a PA as a first year PA student? In my head I associate shadowing with a pre-PA student so I want to make sure its okay before I reach out.

Hey!

I will be starting PA school in 2 weeks and was wondering if you guys have any advice/tips/tricks you learned throughout didactic year that you wish you knew sooner.

I'm looking for ideas to vary it up from just straight lectures. I have procedure workshops and omm days for after covid... But did your residency do anything unique? For example, my (FM) residency had a once a year "memorial service" where we talked about our clinic patients that had passed that year.

We also had every so often a "difficult clinic patients" where you could present one of your clinic patients you were struggling with and ask the group for advice.

I'm starting ClinMed this summer and I was wondering if it's worth it to buy Smarty PANCE now or wait to get it until my clinical year? Also do you have other resources that you found useful during didactic year?

Edit: don't take this the wrong way, I'm not looking for people to tell me that grad school is hard work (and that if I don't expect to do hard work, not to apply). I'm looking for experiences that are below expectation. I fully expect stellar professors and courses, but are there any major frustrations you've experienced in programs other than students not working hard enough?

I've looked at which courses are offered and how they differ on paper, but when I shadowed PAs who were among the first classes at their programs, they weren't enthused about their didactic years.

Are there currently any really stellar programs that guide/prep you really well during the didactic year? Or is it still just chaos and self studying?

Edit: precovid and during covid trends. I'd also appreciate recent firsthand accounts of programs and less hearsay (feel free to use throwaway accounts/PM me if uncomfortable)

I know grades are usually the forbidden topic in pa school and NO ONE cares as long as you pass but how do you really cope with the fact that passing is all you need. I am in second semester of didactic year (almost done yay) and my grades definitely dropped by a whole letter grade. I am mostly getting around 80-84 on all my exams and somehow it makes me very anxious. Any advice/ suggestions as to how to overcome with these feelings? p.s i am also a mommy

Hey pastudent Reddit! I’m three months away from clinicals and wanted to hear everyone’s favorite question bank resources to prepare for the packrat/pance/clinicals. I just ordered PPP as my study resource to go back and study all the material from didactic and we also have access to exam master. Our program gives us access to ROSH clinical year, any other question banks or tips you have to prepare? Thanks guys!

(Note: this is a reasoning-in-progress which I hope to further refine, so my thoughts may be somewhat disorganized.)

The dichotomy of control, in Stoic thinking, is presented as a fundamental truth. There are some things we control and some things we do not; we ought to value what we control and be indifferent to what we do not.

This holds well enough most of the time. However, at the limits of its application, it is not entirely true and not entirely necessary. I would argue that it would be better seen as a didactic tool than as a fundamental truth, and therefore something that can be improved upon (and made more nuanced) when the time comes.

First: that the dichotomy of control is not fundamentally true.

The dichotomy of control states that we have no control over what is external to us and absolute (or substantial) control over the actions of our will. This is a decent approximation. However, it depends on a clear division of "me" from "the world" that doesn't exist when we consider ourselves as collections of smaller parts of the causal networks (rather than single nodes in ourselves). In short, it only works with the notion of some sort of soul or fundamental "me"--which doesn't appear to exist (barring religious views that aren't intrinsic to Stoicism, especially in its secularized modern form). I actually don't have absolute control over my thoughts and judgments; they're abstractions over part of the same causal network that includes my chair, and can be influenced in the same way.

For everyday purposes, it is true enough--but it doesn't really hold under close scrutiny.

Second: that the dichotomy of control isn't necessary, and how we can improve on it

This part is the main thrust of my argument.

The dichotomy of control is useful, to a point, because it is absolute. It doesn't leave room for questionable rationalizations or much dispute at all. If you're valuing anything other than being virtuous, you're wrong, end of story.

However, I'd argue that this absoluteness (in addition to not being strictly true) can, at a certain point, become a hindrance. Generally speaking, artificial absolutes or simplifications are useful up to a certain point, and then not. (Think of how we teach math or physics.)

If a practitioner is able to avoid suffering for or fearing the loss of something without not-valuing it, then they are able to have a fuller experience with greater flexibility of judgment (when needed) while still maintaining a strong Stoic

Hey everyone! I'll be started PA school this summer and one of the things that's been giving me the most stress is time management. I know didactic year is crazy busy and we barely get time to ourselves (from what other PA students have told me) but I wanted to know how clinical year is in comparison. Like is it less about studying and more about learning from the rotations? How much "free" time do you get throughout the day/week/month during didactic vs. clinical years?