Admission to the Doctor of Physical Therapy program is competitive. Admission requirements include:
- Baccalaureate degree from a college or university that holds institutional accreditation (degree in any field) or be in the senior year of undergraduate study. A completed bachelor’s degree is required prior to enrollment, as evidenced by a final official college/university transcript. You may receive conditional acceptance with a letter from your registrar stating you have, in fact, completed the requirements for the degree. The “conditional” status is removed once we receive your official transcript.
- Cumulative grade point average of at least 3.0 on a 4.0 scale
- Overall GPA of at least 3.0 on prerequisite courses from institutionally accredited colleges or universities. Required prerequisite courses include:
- Biology I & II with labs
- Chemistry I & II with labs
- Physics I & II with labs
- Human Anatomy and Physiology I & II with labs
- Pre-calculus
- Statistics
- Psychology
*AP, IB, or CLEP credit will be accepted as pre-requisite courses if the courses are documented on your transcripts and have been accepted by your undergraduate College or University.
- Graduate Record Examination (GRE) within the past 5 years with preferred minimum scores of:
- Combined Score: 297
- Analytical: 4.0
- Submit Scores to PTCAS, Samford Code: 1688
- Ten hours of documented volunteer experience in each of three different physical therapy practice settings (30 hours total)
- The program likes to see applicants spend at least a day and a half (10 hours) in three different settings, observing diverse patient populations (total = 30 hours +). An example of this would be three half days in a children’s hospital outpatient center, one and a half days in a skilled nursing facility; one long day with a physical therapist seeing patients with sports injuries in the clinic, then also on the athletic field later in the evening. The goal of these 30 hours should be to observe the most different practice settings so that the applicant can reflect on the different roles a physical therapist can serve.
- Three letters of reference submitted through the application system. The three required references should be from 1) current or previous professor, 2) work supervisor and 3) a licensed physical therapist.
- International applicants, American citizens or permanent residents who learned English as a second language must score at least 575 (paper) or 90 (internet) on the Test of English as a Foreign Language (TOEFL) or a score of 6.5 on IELTS.
- Participate in an in-person interview.
Upon acceptance, a non-refundable fee of $1,000 is required to secure admission into the program. This fee is applied to the first semester's tuition.
Exceptions to any admission requirements will be handled on an individual basis.
Students and applicants who seek accommodations must make a request by contacting the Section 504/Disability Access and Accommodation Coordinator, 205-726-4078 or disability@samford.edu.
