Sign up soon to become a physician assistant - Air Force News | News from Afghanistan & Iraq - Air Force Times

Sign up soon to become a physician assistant

The Air Force is taking applications from active-duty enlisted airmen for physician assistant training classes beginning in January, April and August 2009, the service announced Wednesday.

Completed applications must arrive at HQ AFPC/DPAMW, 550 C St. West, Suite 27, Randolph AFB, TX 78150-4729, no later than Jan. 25.

The selection board is scheduled to convene at the Air Force Personnel Center at Randolph Air Force Base, Texas, on March 19. Incomplete applications or those received after the cutoff date will be returned and will not be reviewed by the selection board.

The physician assistant program, open to all enlisted personnel, allows airmen to earn bachelor’s and master’s degrees and be commissioned as first lieutenants in the Air Force Biomedical Science Corps. The Air Force has slots for 32 airmen per year to enter the program, said Maj. Gen. Melissa Rank, assistant surgeon general for medical force development and nursing services.

To be eligible, applicants must:

* Be on active duty as an E-3 through E-8.

* Have a minimum of two years and a maximum of 14 years active military service as of Aug. 31, 2009.

* Meet age limitations specified in Air Force Instruction 36-2005 for appointment as second lieutenants in the Biomedical Sciences Corps (less than 42 years of age upon completion of Phase II training).

* Have taken the Scholastic Aptitude Test within five years of the board date, with a minimum score of 450 for all areas, and a minimum combined score of 1,425 in critical reading, verbal and math.

* Have a minimum general score of 80 points on the Armed Services Vocational Aptitude Battery or Air Force Classification Test.

* Have completed 60 semester hours of transferable college credits and a grade point average of 2.5 or better on a 4.0 scale. Thirty of these semester hours must be actual in-classroom courses at an accredited college or university and must be completed by March 10. A combined minimum 3.0 GPA is required in the math and science courses. Thirty semester hours may be met with correspondence courses, end-of-course tests or specific subject examinations from the College Level Examination Program, the Community College of the Air Force, the Defense Activity for Nontraditional Education Support or the United States Armed Forces Institute.

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