Congrats on getting into PT school! Clinical experiences differ a little bit from school to school. Some schools get you into the clinic right from the beginning, and some don’t send you out until the end. However, no matter where you go to school, you will have had several weeks of clinical experience by the time you graduate. You can read about the official APTA requirements for clinical education on APTA’s website. Usually in these experiences, especially the later rotations, students are in the clinic full time and do not have classes (although they may still have assignments for school).
At my school, we have four full-time rotations: eight weeks during fall of year two, 10 weeks the summer after year two, and two nine week rotations during the end of year three. During this time, we have to do an assignment for school, but we have no classes and are at the clinic full time following our clinical instructor’s schedule. I had three long days because that’s what my CI’s schedule was, but some of my classmates had more typical schedules. Since clinicals are full-time during which we’re not in school, they don’t resemble being in school at all. Some describe it as “working for free,” but essentially you are working to treat patients alongside your CI, and becoming increasingly independent as time goes by. You learn a LOT and gaining real-world experience to prepare you to be able to work as a practicing PT as soon as you graduate.