Hi, my wife is currently an AA student. Her background is in the biological sciences with a high GPA from a top school. The toughest part of our decision for her to attend an AA school was the lack of areas to relocate to after she graduates. The quad A says there are 16 states that AA’s can work in, but this is not true!
Many of the states have little to no AA's working in them (examples include CO, KY, NM, TX, MI, and MO). Georgia seems to be the friendliest AA state. Florida has the most promise for us, as many MDA anesthesia groups are interested in hiring AA's.
My wife is really enjoying her clinical training, her course work, and the AA profession as a whole. She feels that her program isn’t at the level of her undergrad work, though. I wanted for her to go the med school route, but she insisted that she didn’t want to do the long 8 years of med school and a residency. Economically, the AA profession makes a lot of sense for non RN’s and those wanting a quality of life that going the med school route can’t supply. An MDA has to practice 15 to 20 years to catch up to an AA who went to grad school at the same time they entered med school. And the CRNA route would have put her into practice 4 to 5 years later than becoming an AA.