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Me too! Would be pretty cool if we both got into Dal for SLP! The personal statement exam was interesting. I kind of enjoyed writing it, even if it isn't my top choice. And yes, I'm eager to find out too!

Yes, everything's submitted! I wrote my personal statement exam for the BSW course through Lakehead on Monday. Now it's just wait and see. The next thing I'm waiting for is letters inviting me to the interviews for OT and PT for McMaster University.

At least you know they're looking at your application! But yes, if I get an email from the schools, my heartrate does speed up a bit too.

I definitely know what you guys mean. I'm working full-time right now, and when I tell my coworkers that I've applied (this isn't my first time around applying too), they all say, "You're smart, you'll get in!" It's not quite that simple... and then they're so surprised when I say I've already applied and didn't get in last year. (In a way, it's a nice compliment, but it doesn't make me feel any better.) It especially sucks, because on average, the Canadian schools (which is where I'm applying) only accept about 10% of the applicants, if that... everything's so competitive here. I keep telling myself that it's out of my hands now, but there's points of time during the day sometimes when I think, "I wonder if they're looking at my application right at this moment... please let me in!!!"

I wish I would have taken more psychology courses (maybe get a minor in psych), been involved in more research, and made stronger relationships with some of my professors.

I simply wrote about my most valuable learning experience and did not include information about my other experiences and reasons for wanting to pursue SLP. If they wanted to know that, they would have asked that, is my thinking. I just tried to make my learning experience applicable to SLP, so I focused on SLP-ish qualities when I wrote it. I hope that makes sense. I sent all of the Dalhousie stuff out on Monday! Eeek!

Yes, I'm adding in employment into the volunteer work part too. I've heard that they want to look at your statement and see that what you've said in your statement matches up with all of the other "evidence" they have from you (eg. your volunteer experience, marks, academic references, etc.).

Hi CDAtoSLP, I applied to a 1 year undergraduate degree in Social Work through Lakehead University (but their Orillia campus). It is a program specifically for people who already have an undergraduate degree in something else, and when you have completed the program, you are just as eligible as any other Social Work undergrad program to apply for Master's programs.

Hello CDAtoSLP, Yes I did find it confusing with the reference letters since I am applying to SLP, OT, and PT at a bunch of different Ontario schools, all using ORPAS. I actually contacted ORPAS to ask about how it works and they weren't very helpful. I wanted to know if they would organize the reference letters since one of my academic referees is my academic referee for all of the programs, and then I have a second academic referee for SLP, and a separate person for the second OT and PT reference. They said that they should write 1 letter to cover everything. However, I encouraged my referees to customize the letters to the specific programs anyway. We'll see what happens. I didn't want them writing a general letter that went to all of the schools - to me, that isn't a good reference letter if it is too general.

Hello, To be honest, I found the U of T session to be terrible. I was pretty embarrassed for them when I sat in on the information session - the people attending knew more than the person presenting the information. And your aunt volunteers at the literacy council here? So do I! lol And I know what you mean about giving you strength or making you cry... I am trying not to compare myself to other people and just do my own thing to the best of my ability. It keeps me sane, lol.

Hello SLPisforme, Sorry for the late reply - working hard on these applications and kind of neglected the forums. This is not the GPA I had when I applied initially - I took 2 online prerequisite courses in addition to improving my resume.

Thank you very much for your response. That's exactly what I'm feeling too, that there's so little space to write what you want. I appreciate your input.

I have a follow-up question... did you include a title in your Personal Statement? My boyfriend (who is a PhD student) is proofreading my Personal Statement drafts, and he keeps insisting that I put in a title. However, the applications are all done online, and you pretty much just copy and paste your statement into the window. My Statements are in essay format, but I'm still unsure whether or not I should include a title.

Sorry Asemooooooo, I meant to say in the last post. My undergrad is in Linguistics.

Hi Asemoooooooo, My cumulative GPA is 3.0, but my GPA for the last 2 years is 3.65, which is what all of the schools I am applying to say they look at. I have also heard (but don't know if it's true) that having a CDA diploma doesn't boost your application very much, so it's good to have other volunteer/work/research experience also. I hope this helps you!

Audie: I will be there for the information session! Driving 9 hours to be there! I'm spending my vacation days to be there and to be at the UofT SLP information session also. Hopefully it will be worth my while. Firefly218: I did not have much difficulty getting email replies back from the people at UofT. Did you ever hear back from them? However, their replies weren't always the most helpful.

I definitely agree that all of those professions have similarities, and they certainly collaborate often. I have contacted the Deans of the departments, and they don't want to meet with me. I guess they don't want to give special treatment to certain students, which I can understand, but it is really quite frustrating. However, I'm going to go to the information sessions and glean as much as I can from them. I have yet to contact Dal, but after I got the news that I was waitlisted, I asked if I would be able to meet with someone to discuss how to improve my application for next year, and they seemed very enthusiastic about doing that, but they told me to wait until September because there was still a chance of getting in. I won't be able to travel there, but I'm hoping I'll be able to talk to someone via telephone or email. I definitely agree that GPAs are too big of a focus for the programs. A GPA does not a good practitioner make! I've worked really hard on improving my resume part of my application, with more relevant experience, as some of that was getting outdated. I am also going to meet with some of my academic referees and talk to them in person, which I hope will give them a reminder of how motivated I am and what I am like, since I have been out of school for so long. It's difficult, because some of the schools want you to have academic references. However, I have been out of the traditional university setting for over 5 years, but I have taken 2 online courses in the meantime, so I don't technically fall under the definition of a student who has been out of school for over 5 years. Very frustrating! Good luck with writing the GRE test! That part is definitely a bit stressful, particularly because you're trying to get your applications completed at the same time.

Hello! Don't worry about being older, I am also 28 (I turn 29 next week), and I'm applying for Speech-Language Pathology also. I applied last year to Dalhousie, McGill, UofT, and Western, and got waitlisted at Dalhousie, and rejected from McGill, UofT, and Western. I applied again this past application cycle, and got the same result. And I am going to apply again this year, and hopefully, third time is a charm! It's funny that you (2014 Appy) mentioned applying for Social Work and OT, because I'm doing the same thing, along with a couple of PT programs also! It's kind of nice to know I'm not the only one doing this. I have been actively trying to improve my application since the last round of rejections in April - I've been volunteering at the local Literacy Council, and volunteering with a Speech Assistant locally. I would really like to volunteer with the SLP there, but she is actually from a town about an hour away, and only comes to town periodically to check in on her Speech Assistant, so I have less opportunities to shadow her, which is a bit frustrating. I also have qualifications as a Communicative Disorders Assistant (aka a speech assistant), and I've been working with a private client who has Down syndrome for the past few years with a different SLP who lives even further away than the other SLP - she lives 2 hours away. Most of our SLPs are from out of town here - they're in high demand in this area because nobody wants to live/work in Northern Ontario. Anyway, I'm going to go visit the Ontario schools in October (including the schools for OT and PT), and possibly McGill also to talk about the programs and tour the facilities, etc. I tried contacting certain professors in the field I'm interested in to see if they would meet with me to discuss my application, etc., but they are giving me the run-around and directing me to the graduate assistant. This is very frustrating and discouraging, but I guess I'll just have to bite the bullet, meet these people, and see what happens from there. Has anyone else tried this and if so, have you had any luck?