Hello! I’m Samantha Blanke, and I’m currently a 2nd year optometry student at Southern College of Optometry in Memphis, TN. I grew up in a small town called Manitowoc, WI, and I went to a small private Catholic high school with a graduating class of 89. I then went on to pursue my bachelor’s degree in dietetics at the University of Wisconsin – Madison.

How I Became Interested in Optometry

I’ve always loved math and science since elementary school, so I knew I wanted to have some sort of STEM career. As I got to high school, I thought I would be a veterinarian someday, but I encountered some roadblocks. Being in the small town that I was, it was nearly impossible for me to get any relevant animal experience. Now, I could have kept pushing, but I took this as a sign that I was meant to do something else. So, I entered UW-Madison as a general biology major. I learned very quickly that this was not what I wanted to do and looked into other majors when I found dietetics. As I was learning about the human body I fell in love (cliché, I know), so I considered becoming a physician’s assistant (PA). In order to apply for PA school, you need at least 1000 direct patient care hours, and I had none at this point (a sophomore). However, I was fortunate enough to meet with a pre-health advisor to explore my options. This is where I learned about a program called SHPEP (Summer Health Professional Education Program). SHPEP is a 6-week summer program that helps freshman and sophomore college students from underrepresented backgrounds gain experience in the healthcare field. This program has multiple different sites throughout the nation, but I attended at Western University in Pomona, CA. Western University is unique in that they have many different professional schools on one campus, so I learned about osteopathic medicine, nursing, physical therapy, dentistry, pharmacy, podiatry, and optometry. This is where I found my passion for the eye and how eye health can tell you what’s going on in the rest of the body. After the program I shadowed more optometrists and ophthalmologists and ultimately decided on optometry.

How I am Following my Passion

I was fortunate enough to choose which optometry school I wanted to attend. I was deciding between Illinois College of Optometry (ICO) in Chicago and Southern College of Optometry (SCO) in Memphis, both of which are amazing schools. One of the reasons I chose to attend SCO over ICO is that ICO is only 2.5 hours from home whereas SCO is 12 hours. I knew that it was only a 4-year commitment, and I wanted to push myself outside of my comfort zone. I lived in Wisconsin my whole life and I wanted to learn about another culture outside of the Midwest. I’ve definitely faced challenges being so far from home and missing my family, especially during this pandemic. But, I’ve learned so much from living in Memphis. It’s the largest city I’ve ever lived in and is 65% African American compared to my hometown which is 85% White with only 1% of the population being African American. This has forced me to come out of my comfort zone and listen to the challenges Memphians face.

Future Steps to my Dream Career

My current next step is to start clinical optometric research. There are some set-backs with COVID-19 and the limited amount of people who are allowed in our clinic right now. Other than focusing on my classes and learning my skills to become an optometrist, I’m not sure what the future holds for me. I’m not sure what type of practice I want to work in or even where I want to live. My entire family is back in Wisconsin, but I’ve really enjoyed this past year without snow. So, we’ll see.

I’ve enjoyed every second of my journey in optometry school so far. It’s been crazy stressful, but also unbelievably rewarding. I can’t speak for what optometry is going to look like coming out of COVID-19, but I will say that optometry is a legislative field. Every state has their own laws and regulations on what an optometrist is allowed to do ranging from whether they can prescribe an anti-viral to performing laser surgery. I don’t say this to steer you away from optometry, but rather to let you know that in order to practice everything you learn in optometry school you need to be at least a little bit involved in the legislative side of the profession.

I’m more than happy to answer any questions you may have or talk in more detail about the challenges I’ve faced. This short summary may make it seem like it was all sunny days, but I assure you it was not. You can also check out my website https://sblankerhs.wixsite.com/samanthablanke/resume if you’d like to learn more about my experiences.

Email: sblankerhs@gmail.com