Student Feature: 21 Questions with Felicia Cicco '24OD

We asked students 21 questions to get to know them, their program, and their experience at Salus University. Here's what they had to say: 

Q: Why did you want to pursue optometry as a career? 

A: I wanted to become an optometrist to help people in general and to get the word out for optometry as not just needing glasses, but also the health aspect of it too. 

Q: Why did you choose the Pennsylvania College of Optometry (PCO) at Salus?

A: I chose PCO/Salus mainly because of the atmosphere, but also because when I came to campus, everyone made me feel like I was part of the family. 

Q: What have you discovered about your subject area as a grad student that you wish you knew as an undergrad student? 

A: I knew that it was going to be challenging, but I didn't know it was going to be this intense. But I definitely fall more in love with it like every day. It's definitely more challenging than I would've thought. 

Q: What do you feel is unique about your program at PCO/Salus? 

A: I think the hands-on clinical experience right from the beginning. I love being in lab and that's the best part because you're learning all these new skills and now we're building up to doing a full eye exam. So that's probably my favorite part about Salus. 

Q: What clinical experience has made an impact on you thus far at Salus? 

A: I think mainly being in the lab and getting to see different kinds of patients, meeting different people and just seeing how different eyes react to different things. 

Q: What's your study strategy? 

A: My study strategy is definitely not so much rewriting my notes but reorganizing them in my own words and making sure that I don't have thousands of slides to go over that are repeating the same information. So, I just condense it all into my own handwriting and color code it to try and see if my brain can understand the colors better. 

Q: What advice would you offer an undergrad considering pursuing an advanced degree in this field? 

A: I would definitely recommend getting into the clinical setting, go and shadow. I did this for four years. I was a receptionist and then worked my way up to optician, but you learn so much from just seeing everything and writing in charts. 

To learn more about the Pennsylvania College of Optometry at Salus University's programs, click here. 

To see Felicia’s full interview, check out the accompanying video.