Student Resources Archives

How I Paid Off $250K in Student Loans One Year After Grad School

By Ricky Locci, DPT, MPH, CSCS | March 6, 2026 |

Four different polaroid photographs of Dr. Ricky Locci are pinned on a corkboard. Each photograph shows Dr. Locci either smiling or interacting with fellow Rizing Tide scholars. A fifth polaroid photograph shows the sun setting over the city of Phoenix, Arizona. There are four sticky notes, each reading as follows. "How I Paid Off $250K in Student Loans One Year After Grad School." "Everybody is dealing with something." "Action without a plan leads to failure." "Rizing Tide."

When I decided to go to graduate school for physical therapy, I was looking at more than $150,000 in student loans for tuition alone. I decided to take it one step further and also get my Master of Public Health as a dual degree—and was looking at a total of $250,000 of debt (not including…

Advancing Men’s Pelvic Health: Expert Perspectives on the Growing Need for Specialized PTs

By Rizing Tide Team | November 11, 2025

Dr. Di Wu, who is wearing a suit jacket and a button up shirt, and Zhen Chen, who is wearing a blue button up shirt, stand in front of a navy blue and terracotta-colored background. A title reads "Let's talk about men's pelvic health."

Men’s pelvic health is a deeply under-explored area of physical therapy. While DPT programs may set aside some time to cover women’s pelvic health, the curriculum often overlooks how conditions present in men—such as with urinary incontinence, sexual dysfunction, and chronic pelvic pain. As a result, many men struggle with health challenges that go untreated—despite…

A Physical Therapy Student’s Advice to Incoming Students

By Sanwal Dilshad, SPT | August 8, 2024

Photo of Rizing Tide scholar, Sanwal Dilshad, who's smiling, dressed in a suit and tie and standing in front of leafy foliage. Behind the photo is a terracotta orange and beige background with a circle made of wavy lines.

As I enter the final year of my physical therapy program, I reflect on how swiftly the journey passed—and how so many of the challenges I once deemed never-ending proved to be transient. I ask myself why I spent numerous hours stressing over moments that were bound to pass. No matter how many times someone…

How to Prepare for Physical Therapy School

By Rizing Tide Team | April 8, 2024

Illustration of a person standing at a fork in the road. Each road leads to a school house, but each path is dotted with hazards and pitfalls.

Journeying toward a doctor of physical therapy (DPT) degree is an incredibly rewarding pursuit. DPTs change their patients’ lives each and every day, offering support and a helping hand to many people who are experiencing life lows. But the DPT journey itself is far from effortless. From crafting a perfect application to surmounting serious financial…

Setting Sail for Success: Navigating the Scholarship Application Journey

By Rizing Tide Team | June 12, 2023

Illustration of brown-haired woman who's wearing a blue backpack and holding a stack of papers walking up steps toward a door labeled "scholarships"

It’s no secret that the cost of higher education is staggering. Student loan debt has surpassed $1.7 trillion in 2023 and it’s only going up from there. Did you know that there are more than 1.7 million private scholarships available to students to help offset the cost of education—with a total value of more than…

6 Steps to Becoming a Physical Therapy Advocate

By Rizing Tide Team | February 2, 2023

An illustrated black woman shouts into a red megaphone. She's popping out of an illustrated phone that's sitting next to a green potted plant. The background is beige with abstract blue and red accents.

Physical therapy (PT) is a discipline that is often overlooked by both insurers and patients. More than 50% of all Americans over the age of 18 report having a musculoskeletal condition like trauma, back pain, or arthritis—that’s about 259 million people in pain for those keeping track—but very few of those injured seek care. This…

The Struggle is Real: Managing Your Mental Health as a DPT Student

By Heidi Jannenga | September 21, 2022 |

An illustrated woman with glasses and brown hair sits with her legs crossed and her eyes closed, meditating in front of a window

Current-day DPT students are staring down a tsunami of stressful situations. Not only are you facing significant societal and professional challenges (e.g., DPT debt, social polarization, understaffed clinics, declining Medicare payments), you’re also navigating the process of becoming a licensed medical professional. The struggle is definitely real—and if you feel like you’re buckling under the…

Everything You Need to Know About the New Student Loan Forgiveness Plan

By Melissa Hughes | August 26, 2022 |

An illustrated woman with brown hair, white glasses, and a striped orange shirt, sits at a table with a stack of books, writing on a piece of paper.

Published August 26, 2022 Student loan debt is a $1.6 trillion problem for more than 45 million Americans—or at least, it was until this week. On Wednesday, August 24, President Biden announced a student loan forgiveness plan that will cancel $10,000 (or $20,000 for Pell Grant recipients) of federal student loan debt for every eligible…

6 Secrets to Success for Aspiring DPT Students

By Rizing Tide Team | July 6, 2022 |

illustration of two students sitting on oversized books and reading

Are you wondering how to get into a DPT program? As a prospective doctor of physical therapy (DPT) student, getting into your chosen DPT school may feel like a daunting goal—especially as you work to maintain your competitive undergraduate GPA while simultaneously preparing applications for various programs. (Yeesh!) Fear not, though—many student physical therapists have…

How to Network as a PT Student

By Melissa Hughes | April 20, 2022

Networking is key to a fruitful and far-reaching career. If you’ve spent any amount of time looking up professional development advice or job-hunting tips, you’ve probably encountered some iteration of that advice. It lives on countless webpages and is passed around more freely than a bucket of popcorn at a movie theater. But unlike digging…