<p>I’m 24 and have decided to better my life and go to Surgical Tech School. It is a full time program which would require me to quit my great paying job. I’m going to start taking my pre-requisites in January (A&P and Medical Terminology) to at least get started. So, here lies my problem. Do I get out a huge loan in order to better my life (probably 30-50 grand) and then more loans for Med school, or do I drag this out? I’m a first time student with poor credit history. I don’t know what to do and some advice would help me out a lot. How do I go about getting a loan?</p>
<p>Are they actively hiring surgical techs at local hospitals? Have they hired graduates of the surgical tech school lately, how many get jobs right after completing the program? It seems foolish to give up a perfectly good paying job in these shaky economical times if you can’t get a job after completing the program. You can go part time at a community college for your prerequisites, pass the classes and then apply for the program. You don’t have to give up the paycheck until you’ve been accepted into the program. Good Luck. 30-50 K for a certificated surg tech program? Sounds too expensive.</p>
<p>And that’s what I was figuring. I think I’ll just take the pre classes and decide what to do after that. The 30-50 I was talking about would be living expenses, rent, car, insurance etc. So you think it would be best to just go part time then figure out what I’m going to do?</p>
<p>Why stop working? Take A&P, Med terminology at the community college to see if you even want to be back in school. Save up your money for school while you work. Cut waaayy back on all your expenses for the next 2 years and see if your credit rating goes up and keep you from borrowing. Try to save at least 30% of your take home pay for school. No way you need 30K to live on, cut back dude.</p>
<p>“Med School” ends (hopefully) with an MD. I think you are considering community college for surg tech pre-reqs, and then tech school. The pre-reqs you need to take are easy classes for some people, and hard for others. No one on this forum can tell you what kind of student you are.</p>
<p>Surely, a student that can combine work and CC is well advised to do so. If you are unsure, I suggest trying both at the same time. If you flunk, and think that more time to study was the missing ingredient, then cut down your living expenses <em>drastically</em>, and take out the minimum loans required to finish the pre-reqs in the least amount of time possible.</p>
<p>If you’re able to cut your hours at your present job, go part time to school. It may take you longer but you wouldn’t have to take out as much in loans to cover your expenses. That’s what I did my first year; there was no way I could give up my job just to put myself in necessary debt. Having debt to go to school does not make your life easier.</p>
<p>Loans for living expenses? Absolutely not. I mean, it’s perfectly acceptable if you’re going to an MD. Otherwise, remember this rule of thumb:</p>
<p>Either you live like a student now, or later.</p>
<p>If you borrow money to live, you’ll spend years and years paying it off.</p>