Search Results

How to Visit Webinars Recruitment Events Focus on Your Future Home • Admissions • Visiting ICO • How to Visit How to Visit We're always happy to have you visit! Open House & Getting Here Visit us in person We would love to show you around our campus. Whether as part of your scheduled interview or before you even apply to ICO, we’re happy to give you a taste of what makes ICO so special to us. Connect during open house Open house is your opportunity to get to know ICO and the profession of optometry inside and out. You will meet with students and admissions representatives, tour campus and the clinic, and most importantly learn what makes ICO unique. Our Admissions Open House takes place each Summer. Our next event will be held from 9:00 am - 1:30 pm (CST) on June 7, 2025 . Online registration has closed; however you can register on site starting at 8:30 AM. We look forward to seeing you at the event! Open House Registration Take a self-guided tour of campus Throughout your time at ICO, the EyePod will play an essential role in developing and honing your clinical skills. ICO students have many favorite haunts. You’ll have lots of places to study and to relax. Get to know some of these places a little better. You’ll be studying a lot during your time here and we want to make sure you stay healthy throughout. So, for your convenience, the cafeteria and gym are located just around the corner from the Eyepod and lecture center. Keep Exploring Travel to ICO Visitors to ICO must enter the campus through the Indiana Avenue entrance (3240 S. Indiana.) Visitor parking is available at this entrance. Please sign in at the front desk before exploring ICO. Taxis/Shuttles The fare from either airport varies depending upon traffic conditions. Visitors have reported fares from Midway in the range of $25-35, and from O’Hare in the range on $40-60. Taxis are readily available outside the arrival/baggage claim areas of both airports. Airport Express Transportation (shuttle to major hotels in Chicago) operates from both airports to zip code 60616. Public Transportation From O’Hare, take the Blue Line southeast to downtown Chicago. Take the Blue Line to the Clark/Lake stop, and transfer to the Green Line train. Take the Green Line south to the 35th/Bronzeville/IIT stop, in the middle of the Illinois Institute of Technology’s campus. Walk north to 33rd Street. Take a right on 33rd, then walk two blocks to Indiana Avenue. At Indiana Avenue take a left. ICO’s entrance is a half block north on Indiana. From Midway, take the Orange Line northeast to the Roosevelt stop. At Roosevelt, transfer to the Green Line headed south. Then follow the directions above from the Green Line to ICO. For further information about public transportation, check out the website of the Chicago Transit Authority. Where to stay The following hotels offer special rates to ICO visitors. If calling for reservations, ask for the “Illinois College of Optometry” rate. The rate may also be accessed when booking online. Please keep in mind there may be blackout dates and prices are always subject to availability. Hyatt Regency McCormick Place 2233 S. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Dr. Chicago, IL 60616 312-567-1234 $169/night + tax (use code 80599) Loews Hotel 455 North Park Drive Chicago, IL 60611 312-840-6600 15% off Best Available Rate Hampton Inn Chicago McCormick Place 123 E. Cermak Chicago, IL 60616 312-363-1211 Student rate $109 15% off Best Available Rate; (Call to make a reservation using the Best Available Rate, 312-791-1121, mention company name Illinois College of Optometry.) Hilton Garden Inn Chicago McCormick Place 123 E. Cermak Chicago, IL 60616 312-363-1211 15% off Best Available Rate Home2 Suites by Hilton Chicago McCormick Place 123 E. Cermak Chicago, IL 60616 312-363-1211 15% off Best Available Rate SpringHill Suites Chicago Chinatown 2357 South Wentworth Avenue Chicago, Illinois, 60616 Office of Admissions CONTACT P. 312-949-7400 E admissions@ico.edu LOCATION Illinois College of Optometry Office of Admissions 3241 S. Michigan Ave Chicago, IL 60616 CONNECT

Home Consumer Information Estimated Cost of Attendance (2025 - 2026) You might notice years 1 and 4 are 9-month years while years 2 and 3 are 12-month years. This means the total cost reflects an extra quarter of tuition and living expenses. Year 1 Year 2 Year 3 Year 4

SEARCH MENU access to mobile menu Your contribution helps us continue our 150 years of education, research and service. Thank you.

In third grade, Janice McMahon, OD  attended a circus performance only to discover she saw very little of it clearly. Luckily, her uncle was engaged to an ICO student. One eye exam later she had the diagnosis: a –3.50 myope.   Before then “Despite the stereotype, of course I knew there were leaves on trees,” says Dr. McMahon, “but I didn’t know there were wires between telephone poles.” It was only after she got her first pair of glasses that she realized just how many more details the world had. “Since then, I knew I wanted to be an optometrist.” She has now been a faculty member at ICO for 25+ years and was recently named IOA’s Optometrist of the Year. We sat down to learn about the IOA and Dr. McMahon’s career at ICO. Why has it been important for you to be involved in both the IOA and the AOA? How has legislation improved the field of optometry? Say you're someone in rural Louisiana (not far from where I went to college): your partner drives a whole hour and a half, all for the chance that a doctor might help you see more clearly. When you arrive, the doctor tells you she cannot treat you because it is not in her scope of practice. The doctor can’t provide valuable care, and you and your partner lose three hours with no resolution. Without a strong representative body, optometrists risk being trained at a higher level than they're ever legally allowed to practice. That gap undermines their education, their careers, and ultimately, patient care. We need advocates who will defend our current scope of practice and fight to expand it. We need people who are looking at the bigger picture and fighting to ensure that the largest number of patients get the most comprehensive care possible. This is what the AOA and the IOA are doing, and I find it admirable. It’s about meeting patients where they are, whether that’s here in Chicago or in the rural South. In addition to IOA and AOA roles, I served on the Illinois State Board of Optometry for almost 13 years. It’s been a really important part of my optometric career. Ultimately, I am so involved because when we expand our scope, we help more patients.   You were just recently chosen as Optometrist of the Year by the IOA. Why do you believe they chose you as optometrist of the year? This honor came as quite a surprise to me. I’m someone who much prefers to be behind the scenes, and I honestly didn’t think I was on anyone’s radar. I’m guessing the reason is two-fold. I think part of it is the length of my tenure in legislative roles, and it’s how I’ve been able to connect the academic and legislative sides of this profession. While I’m a faculty member, I’ve also served on several national and state committees. This isn’t all that common, but it's been an important part of my career. As academicians, we teach optometry to its fullest scope, but state regulations often limit what our graduates can actually practice. Both the IOA and the AOA have given me a good perspective of what optometry is like outside of academic circles. Their work is vital to the growth of this profession. This is going to be a fight, and it will be for a couple generations down the road. It’s important to support them as best I can. When I think back to what we were able to practice when I graduated, it’s amazing to see how much we have grown as a profession. We've had a dozen or more legislations come through since then. Each has made our field richer. You work full time in the clinic, why? What about the patients has made you want to stay? I loved the courses I taught at ICO, but after 15 years of teaching the same course, I realized I didn't want to be in front of a group anymore. I much preferred being in the background, so I naturally gravitated towards clinical care and one-on-ones with students. The courses were passed on to faculty members who wanted to grow them. I provided a basis, and they energetically and very capably expanded on that. That freed up my time to do more of what I love—interacting with our patients and our students. It’s important for me to show students that every patient we see is an individual, and we must treat them as the person in our chair, not as a statistic or as a disease. Ultimately, this person has to go home and live with whatever we ‘ve told them. I want patients to understand their condition. So, I spend a lot of time and energy making sure I'm communicating in a way that resonates with them. Our treatment only goes as far as the care they are willing to accept. In the end, their wellbeing lies in their hands. How have you seen ICO and optometry grow since you arrived at ICO? The students have changed quite a bit. It used to be you would graduate, and your career path would be pretty straightforward. Students today are willing to take the time to explore their options, partly because there are now so many more opportunities available. Optometry has embraced the medical side of our profession without forgetting that we are also refractive and contact lens providers. Optometry really is both, and we can’t be so focused on the medical side that we forget that we provide an incredible service: that of improving people’s vision. We were hyper focused on the medical side for a while, now we are better balanced. At the end of the day, optometrists care deeply about providing the best care possible, and we do that when we embrace the full scope of what our profession offers. What's one thing you want incoming students to know about the field of optometry? As you go through these four years, get as much out of this experience as possible, keep an open mind, and have a broad base. The profession is going to continue to evolve, and you will need to grow with it. Optometry is an incredibly dynamic field, and it will change and expand over the course of your career. What you do at the beginning may not be what you’re doing ten years from now or as you near retirement. Learn a little about everything and be flexible. If you want to practice all modes of optometry, you can. If you want to concentrate on a specific specialty area, that’s also fine. Optometry is incredibly rewarding. It's a career that I have never regretted for a minute. It's not a stagnant profession at all and the possibilities keep me moving forward. What's one piece of advice for students who are currently pursuing their degree in optometry? You’ll work with many attendings at ICO. You’ll like some approaches more than others, but every single one of them has something to teach you. Take the best of what you see and use it to shape yourself into the kind of doctor you want to become. Your practice will ultimately be a reflection of all the people who helped you grow. Even today, I see how a colleague explains a certain illness to a patient, and I think, “Oh, I’ve never thought of it in that way before.” That ongoing learning has made me a better doctor and communicator. I also want to encourage students to look beyond optometry. Many optometrists derive a lot of meaning from the organizations they’re involved in. Optometry will be a big part of your life, but don’t let it be your whole life. Look for what brings you joy outside of work, too. It’s all part of building a life that feels full and meaningful.

Tell us a little bit about yourself and how you got into optometry. What drew you to ICO? I always knew I wanted to work in healthcare, but for a long time I didn’t know which career was right for me. I wanted to do meaningful work and healthcare felt like the right field to do this. When I learned about optometry, I realized it was the perfect fit for me. This is in part because I myself have experienced its incredible impact. I’m moderately myopic, and I vividly remember my optometrist fitting me for contact lenses so that I could continue playing college basketball without worrying about glasses. Personally, I was fascinated by the idea of helping people improve their vision and the impact that good vision can have on a person's quality of life. I’m born and raised in Chicago, but I ended up leaving for college. I interviewed at quite a few optometry schools, but I kept returning to ICO, not only because of my family, but because of how great the clinic is here. My time at ICO was so special, and it's where I made some of the most meaningful friendships of my life. We've been through so much together - weddings, funerals, vacations, and more. It's a bond that I cherish deeply, and I feel truly grateful to have made such wonderful friends during my time at ICO. The community that ICO has built fosters lasting connections, and I'm so grateful for the relationships that I've built there. After graduating, I pursued a residency in low vision rehabilitation at PCO/Salus. I returned to Chicago and started working in the field of low vision rehabilitation. When I started working at ICO, I realized it sparked other passions in me. I love being able to teach other fledgling doctors the importance of low vision rehabilitation and how we an optometrist can impact patients’ and improve their quality of live. I wanted to be able to train the next generation of optometrists and continue to make a positive impact on people's lives. I am incredibly grateful for the opportunities that I have had in my career and the people who have supported me along the way. It has been a rewarding and fulfilling career. What's one thing you would like incoming students to know about the field of optometry? (And your specific area of optometry) Low vision rehabilitation is all about helping people who have lost some or all of their vision to improve their functional abilities and live their best lives. In other words, how to maximize their remaining vision. We aren't able to fix the health of their eyes, but rather we focus on how they can best utilize the vision they have left. That can involve using all kinds of services, devices and technology. This includes magnification devices, assistive technology, or even smartphone apps that help people with vision impairments achieve their specific goals. When we work with patients at the low vision rehabilitation clinic, we start by determining what their goals are. For some, it might be reading large print or using a computer, and for others, it might be effectively navigating airports or their environments at home. Once we understand their goals, we use our knowledge to help them find the best solutions. Every patient is different, and so we use all the information we have available to find the best solution for them. For some, that might mean a simple magnifier, but for others that could be using a biopic telescope, or even employing apps that connect them to someone who can help them navigate a specific area. What makes low vision rehabilitation interesting is just how many things we have available to help patients. It's really interesting and rewarding to be able to help people in this way. Low vision rehabilitation is often life-changing. It’s easy to be passionate about what you do when you are making such an impact with each patient. Another thing I want to emphasize is just how close knit our optometric community is. Optometry is a small field, but it's one that's incredibly powerful. Through organizations like VOSH and my work as a faculty member, I've been able to connect with so many passionate people. We share a common goal of improving people's eye health, and it's a truly rewarding experience to be able to work together towards that goal. It's an honor to be a part of this community, and I'm grateful every day for the opportunity to help people through optometry. You're very active in the VOSH community. Why do you think these organizations are important? Why do you choose to participate in them? I've been fortunate to meet many amazing people who have selflessly given their time and energy to help others. My mentor, Dr. Alfred Rosenbloom, got me interested in VOSH (Volunteer Optometric Services to Humanity). I did my first VOSH trip with him to Morocco. We too easily get stuck in our day-to-day routines; we don’t always recognize the impact we are giving. On VOSH trips locally or internationally, something as simple as a routine refraction can be incredibly impactful. Throughout my many years of practice, I've witnessed countless moments where simple skills like retinoscopy and refraction have changed people's lives for the better. Showing just how much of an impact we are having is one of the most important lessons that I want to impart to our students. For example, during the COVID-19 pandemic, I challenged our students to find community organizations we could work with to provide relief. They found several organizations, and at every clinic we did, we easily worked with over 100 patients. We were able to provide comprehensive eye care and new eyeglasses to people who were struggling financially and otherwise would not have been able to afford it. How do you see optometry changing in the next few years and how do you hope to be part of it? Optometry has opened up a wealth of opportunities for me to connect with people from all over the world who share my passion for helping others. Through organizations like VOSH and my work as a faculty member, I've been able to build a strong network of colleagues who are dedicated to improving people's eye health and advance the profession of optometry globally. Optometry is truly a special field. Every day, we have the privilege of helping maintain ocular health, help people see better, feel more comfortable, and live their lives to the fullest. It's a profession that allows us to make a real difference in people's lives, and it's one that offers a great balance between work and life.

Dr. Kelly Frantz has been teaching at ICO since 1986. With over 30 years of experience, she's seen ICO change and grow over the years. Read on to learn how she discovered optometry (she was only 12!), how she learned that teaching was her passion and how teaching at ICO has evolved and changed over the decades she has been here. When did you become interested in optometry? Well, I got into optometry by starting to learn about it all the way back in seventh grade. I had myopia like so many other kids, and I was intrigued how my optometrist helped me see more clearly. I was also into science. In seventh grade, they asked us to start thinking about what we wanted to be when we grew up. And so, I started researching optometry in my school library. At that time, as you know, there was no internet. There weren't a lot of fancy resources, but I learned about the profession, asked my optometrist more about it, and continued to seriously consider it throughout high school. At that point, I wasn't thinking about optometric education, just doing eye exams. I didn't even know that much about optometry, but somehow, I just knew it was the profession for me. How has ICO changed over the years? What is it about ICO that's made you stay for all these years? The people -- the students, the other faculty -- it's a warm, inviting community, and I enjoy being with these folks. I find great satisfaction in teaching the students, the specialty I've gotten into, and the opportunities that ICO has provided me to engage in research, clinical care, and teaching. I’m very fulfilled staying at ICO, and I haven't wanted to go elsewhere. Over the years, there have been a lot of changes. We’ve completely changed how we teach. The information has changed, but also the methods that information is relayed have changed. I remember when we used overhead transparencies, and then we graduated to a tray of 35-mm slides. Sometimes we even projected two slides simultaneously, which back then was a really big deal. Eventually, we embraced PowerPoint to create and project slides. Then, we began streaming our classes from the Lecture Center. At ICO, some faculty are more heavily involved in clinic while others spend more time in labs. Dr. Frantz found her passion in teaching and teaches vision therapy to third years in the fall. Video has also become an important didactic tool. I teach a lot in the laboratories, and so we need to do demonstrations. We used to do that just spontaneously explaining it to our students as they gathered around us. There was nothing archival for them to study later. Now, we have videos that show how to do a lot of vision therapy procedures. These videos have evolved over the years. There used to be a DVD, but now they're on Brightspace. Students can watch them over and over again ad nauseam. They can study and practice for their practical exam as well as review them when they need to use those procedures in the clinic. It sounds like you’re a person who really loves education and the innovation that comes from different generational needs and expectations. Would you agree? I haven’t seriously thought about education my whole life, but my mother would say that I have. At six, I was playing school with my little brother. I’d sit him down and make him do worksheets that I made for him. For some reason, he cooperated even though he was only three. At PCO/Salus where I got my OD degree, I was a teaching assistant. I also did a residency at my optometry school to further explore the opportunity of teaching, and that's when I really decided, "Yes, this is for me." That's what I've done ever since. Over the years, Dr. Frantz has seen how teaching has evolved here at ICO. In particular, the use of video has made it much easier for students to return to the vision therapy procedures that Dr. Frantz teaches in her lab. It's much more intriguing to me to do patient care when there are students involved because I have the excitement of sharing that experience with them. I like to see the light bulb go on for the students as they start to understand things and see something they learned about in the classroom now applied in clinic. What's one thing that you would want incoming students to know about the field of optometry and also your field specifically? I want incoming students to be aware of all the facets of optometry. I want them to know there are so many options within optometry and that becoming a doctor requires a lot of hard work. They need to be ready psychologically for the journey ahead, to study diligently, and to juggle all the classes, laboratories, and clinic sessions with dedication. To be an excellent optometrist, there’s a lot to know. I believe ICO does an excellent job of producing well-rounded optometrists, since our students are exposed to all specialties. For me, that meant getting involved in binocular vision and pediatrics because of my interest in eye alignment, movement, and my mathematical inclination. Binocular vision is essential because everyone relies on their eyes to gather information. Today so much of that information is relayed to us via digital devices. People need to work efficiently on these screens. By evaluating and treating focusing, eye alignment, and aiming, I can help people work more comfortably. Binocular vision issues have always existed, but they are now exacerbated by the amount of screen time people engage in. There are so many paths you can take as an optometrist. Dr. Frantz chose binocular vision and pediatrics, and now teaches it as well. Any closing thoughts on what it’s like to be a teacher at ICO? Something really important about ICO is that we have a long history. So, we have a lot of experience in optometric education. We have a lot of very experienced faculty, and I think that can set us apart. When I'm teaching in a lecture or lab, I can draw on many years of experience. I know ahead of time which things are going to trip up the students, so I can explain it more than one way. Anticipating the problems that they might have; I try to be as thorough and accurate as possible in explaining what the students need to know. That comes in part from our long history and my own long history with the institution. Then, there are our patients. Even a routine diagnosis in our clinic often brings with it a patient who has so many other issues that it becomes complex. We're managing more than a vision problem; we're managing the issues of the patient not having time to do the vision therapy we've prescribed at home or not wearing their glasses because they don't like how they fit, or the kids are teasing them at school. Those things need to be addressed. With children and vision therapy, there are those issues. With adults who have eye disease, there are issues of access to medication they might need or the ability to put drops in their eyes if they live alone. We find that we're managing all kinds of complexities. The education the students receive is top-notch because of these experiences.