I am currently finishing my undergrad in psychology and plan on applying to clinical programs this fall. I have been checking into a lot of schools, and I have been looking at the admissions statistics. I'm not going to lie, it's really intimidating to look at. There are SO many applicants and very few get accepted. So I guess my question is do I even have a chance?
Allow me to give you a little background: my current undergrad GPA is a 3.67 (it will probably go up to a 3.7 or higher after I finish my summer classes), I haven't taken my GRE yet, I have done 2 semesters of research with a professor at my university (but it's really only been running subjects through the experiment, unfortunately), I was a TA for a psych stats/research design class, and I know I will get GREAT letters of recommendation from 3 professors. Other information that I'm not sure if it helps me get into a program: I will be graduating with 70 credit hours in psychology, and my GPA within subject is a 3.87. Also, my job for the last 5 years has been working at a group home for mentally ill people, and for the last 6 months I have been working as a mental health technician at a psychiatric hospital.
Another question I have is what I should put in my personal statement. I know some guidelines (research interests, career goals, etc.) but I'm not entirely sure what to say or how to say it. Should any additional information be put into my personal statement? I also saw that a couple schools I'm looking into ask for a writing sample. What exactly does this mean/what are they looking for? Will a lit review paper from one of my undergrad classes suffice? Also, I started at a community college and transfered to a university. Do I need to have the transcripts from the community college sent to the schools as well? I went through a lot of personal issues my first couple years of college, so my GPA from the community college is crap (like a 2.8). Will this hurt my chances when I apply? Should I address my GPA from the community college in my personal statement?
Also, since these programs are so competitive, should I have a backup? Or should I just continue to re-apply? I'm really interested in schizophrenia and neuropsych, so I would ideally love to be able to work in an inpatient unit and/or teach and conduct research. With that in mind, what would be a good possible alternate/backup program to apply to?
I'm sorry this is so long, I just have a lot of questions and don't really know where to begin with all of this. Any tips/advice/help would be GREATLY appreciated!!!