Professional D.P.T. : School of Health Sciences : Simmons College

Men and women with a baccalaureate degree in a field other than physical therapy may apply for this program. Applicants must have successfully completed the prerequisites.

The School of Health Sciences (SHS) has subscribed to the PTCAS (Physical Therapy Common Application System)process initiated by the APTA . Specific details about this new application option can be found at www.ptcas.org. The Simmons application deadline is now December 1 for consideration for the class entering the following June. Please click on the catalog and application link in the left margin of this page for futher information about this new application process.

Professional Program

The professional program requires a full-time commitment of three years and culminates in the Doctor of Physical Therapy (D.P.T.) degree. Students begin the program in summer session (approximately July 1). The curriculum is designed to educate women and men to serve patients in the areas of health promotion, disease prevention, and rehabilitation. The didactic and clinical course material in each semester is well integrated to allow students to synthesize and apply newly acquired knowledge and skills. Students in the professional curriculum attend classes on the Simmons campus and at Harvard Medical School for Advanced Human Anatomy. More than 200 clinical sites, located across the country, are affiliated with Simmons College and provide students with the opportunity to work with skilled clinicians and to participate in the practice of physical therapy. The degree program is accredited by the Commission on Accreditation in Physical Therapy Education of the American Physical Therapy Association.

Simmons Undergraduate-to-Professional Program

Women may be accepted at Simmons as freshmen or as sophomore or junior transfer students. For students entering as freshmen, the physical therapy major extends over a period of six years. The first three years are devoted to fulfilling requirements in the necessary basic and social sciences, liberal arts, and electives. During the final three years, students are enrolled in the School of Health Sciences and take courses in the professional curriculum. At the end of four years, a student receives a B.S. degree. At the end of the six years the doctoral degree is awarded. The completion of the doctoral degree is required to be eligible to take the examination for licensure and to practice physical therapy. Click here for information on the undergraduate physical therapy program at Simmons.

Teaching Methodology

Teaching and learning within small groups, using real-life cases, and a problem-based approach to learning facilitates contextual application of information. Students learn by doing. Evidence-based practice is fostered through self-directed learning, which includes use of a wide variety of sources of information enhanced by technology. Students must have the ability to access, retrieve, and critically appraise content from multiple knowledge domains. Interdisciplinary course work allow students to interact with and learn from other health disciplines.

The teaching and learning experiences in the Program reflect our beliefs and values. Meeting the challenges of the health care environment and developing the necessary knowledge and skills to do so cannot be accomplished in a passive, traditional learning environment. Therefore, we have designed the curriculum with a focus on interactive, student-centered, learning experiences in which students determine how they will learn, practice the research process, analyze and solve problems, and communicate and collaborate regularly with peers and faculty.

Courses emphasize information-gathering and synthesis and discussion of actual clinical cases that focus on patients/ clients who need physical therapy care. The forum for these discussions is a small group of six to seven students led by an academic or clinical faculty member, meeting three to four hours each week. Students in these "tutorial" groups identify the patients'/ clients' problems, collect and synthesize information they deem necessary to gain understanding of the problems, communicate information to their peers, pose and respond to questions within the group, and propose solutions to the problems they have identified based on the information gathered and discussed. The faculty member, usually an expert in the area of study, facilitates the discussion. These discussions become the basis for learning, as well as the foundation for professional growth and development.

If you have additional questions about the D.P.T. Program, please see our FAQ.