PschoolPsychology

to add on to this, my experience was that you can check the average scores accepted for most programs on their website. There's also a book published by the APA called Graduate School in Psychology which does list out the numbers of total applicants, number of applicants accepted, average and minimum GRE scores, due dates, and accreditation status among other things for all programs in the U.S. and Canada.

I went through the application process last year, so I'd be happy to provide some advice to people. Some of my impressions from going to interviews at major universities (Note: This is for Ph.D. programs, but outside of the stats provided in the first bullet point I think it applies to any degree): - You should expect that everybody else in the room with you will have a 3.5+ GPA, ~320 combined GRE, and research experience. Try not to get too alarmed by this if it looks intimidating because this won't always be the case for every individual, but it's a competitive pool of people that are applying for these positions and you need to find some unique way to make yourself stick out among them. - If you have time to study for the GRE, it's well worth it. It means a lot in terms of getting invited to interviews and it can mean a lot for the funding offered to you if you do get accepted. One summer of studying bumped my scores from a 156/156/4.0 to a 164/158/5.0, and that along with one year of work experience bumped me from being rejected to a masters program to being accepted to two doctoral programs. It can be very rewarding to give it your best shot on that test, especially if this isn't your first application cycle. - Some of the more impressive things you can have for added value would be relevant work experience, presentations, and research publications. Departments will vary on how much they care about this, but at the very least it gives you a good thing to talk about during your interviews. - Know the professor (possibly professors) that you'd be interested in working under at the university you apply to. Read their research so that you know their overall interests and recent projects, and try to make some form of contact with them before interviews happen. In my opinion this is the biggest thing that can set you apart from the pack because that's how you can show a program that you'd be a valuable member if accepted and that you can be independently motivated. You should bump your GREs! Your GPA is fantastic but it needs the GRE scores to back it up or else you're in danger of people not looking at your application very carefully. There's some good resources you can buy online (I used Kaplan books and flash cards) and taking practice exams can be very helpful to learning how they try to trick you. The only one of those schools I can give insight to is Columbia, which I had a bad experience with. I was mainly annoyed that we didn't get a chance to talk with faculty members one on one (there was a discussion panel), and I know someone else in the thread for 2015 was frustrated by the response time it took to hear a decision from them. It is a prestigious program though, and I don't want to talk you out of being interested in it.

Finally made my decision, I'll be attending the University of Tennessee Knoxville

Someone else could probably give you a better answer on this, but if you get yourself into a program that is NASP and APA accredited then it sounds to me like the ball is in your court in terms of what you'll achieve as a graduate student. UW could probably offer you some more resources to work with and potentially have better opportunities available to you, but whether or not those are worth the trade off financially is debatable and up to you. From my understanding of the situation I would choose the route that eases the financial strain of the situation so long as I felt a good program fit, because then it would be easier for me to focus purely upon my studies.

I heard that there were four Ph.D. programs that are APA and NASP certified that are hosted purely in the psychology department at a university (South Carolina, LSU, Syracuse and I forget the fourth). That was in contrast to programs which are offered in School Psychology or Educational Psychology departments which would probably not be able to provide as much funding supposedly

I did, their interview date is in about two weeks. I applied to their Ph.D. program originally and got an email in late January telling me that I'd have a higher chance of admission if I reclassified to the Ed.M. program.

Amid all of the waiting for information from programs, Tennessee got back to me remarkably quick. I finished up my application to their program yesterday and I got an email today informing me that I am invited to interview at the University on my choice of February 6th or February 27th. I'm also going to my first two interviews next week at South Carolina and Georgia, something which is both exciting and terrifying. I'm trying to calm myself down by saying that at the least it means I'm getting out of Albany for a week! Best of luck to everybody

If you can't edit the application after submission you should be able to have the recommendation mailed from the professor directly to the program so that the application can be considered complete, though that isn't the preferred route for you or them

How close are you to your next deadline? One things that comes to mind is to see if his office hours are posted on the university's website anywhere, but I'd say that you could very well be in the lull period now where he is unreachable in person. Start planning for a worst case scenario where you may have to message somebody at the program you're applying to in order to explain the situation while also possibly reaching out to another professor to see if they'd be willing to give you a last second LOR. Don't freak out to much over the things that are out of your control though, as I've read other applicants say that they've been accepted to programs when their LOR's were submitted after deadlines. Make sure that you get in all of your other materials on time and continue trying to make contact with the professor and the program

Try not to look at it from the perspective of choosing which faculty member you want to work for, but instead write about the faculty member's interests that you find to be the most interesting. You don't need to pick out who you're going to be working under in your SOP but you want to make sure that they can see you as an applicant who's at least semi-familiar with the department and holds some related research interests, so it would be wise to mention some professor(s) you would like to meet. 10 days is long enough to write a decent-good SOP, but you've got to get the first draft done soon and then start the revision process. The longer that you wait the more difficult that it will become, so I would set a goal about completing it in the next few days and then revise them every chance you get after that.

I've been carrying the mindset that any program that turns me down is going to have made a mistake, and that if this happens it will lead to me becoming an even better candidate in the next application cycle. In terms of my day-to-day life, I'd keep my current job as a group-home counselor unless I could get myself a job in a lab, and I would try to take some non-degree classes over the summer as well.

Might be to late to re-take the GRE at this point, but it would probably be a good idea if you need to do future application cycles after this one. GRE scores can mean a lot in how they will initially view your application, and it's a test that you can study for if you dedicate yourself towards it and stay organized. I'd say a nice goal would be to push one of your scores into the 160's (I went from a 156/156/4.0 to a 164V/158Q/5.0 after a summer of studying)

I received two official invitations to interview today at Georgia and South Carolina! South Carolina holds an interview on Friday January 23 in addition to an evening event the day before and the day of, and Georgia's interview day is Monday January 26th with a potluck the night before. If anybody else has gotten an invite to either of these dates shoot me a pm and we'll talk!

I think that you should try to email both schools and let them know about your potential scheduling conflict, and see if either one has a contingency plan for applicants in your situation to visit at another time. If they're both locked in to the same time period, I say you have to choose to visit the one that you like more at this time, but that's just me .

This is my first application cycle, but I feel like that's a pretty minor error to make since you've already presumably provided them with your academic transcript. If they have a line for your in-major GPA on the application then you probably should have computed it and entered it at the time, but at this point I wouldn't worry about it since deadlines have passed.

Good news for the day is that my phone interview with the professor from South Carolina went really well, and he informed me that I was going to be invited to the campus for an interview and started mentioning possible stipends (Does this qualify as a result to submit to the database or do I need to wait for an officially dated invite?). I'm elated about that, but also a bit worried about one of my other schools as I saw that two people got contacted by LSU today via email and I haven't heard from them yet. Still, all things considered, it's a great day!

I got an email from a professor at South Carolina yesterday where he told me that even though I had listed different professors as my possible mentors at the school, I might have interest in performing research in his lab instead. We're in the process of scheduling a phone conversation at the moment but in the meantime I've got to make myself familiar with his work pretty quickly so that I don't leave a bad impression. It's certainly not how I expected my first correspondence to go but I'm happy to hear any news that carries the potential for promising results.

No problem! Loyola Chicago was actually on my short list for applications too and was one of the last schools that I ended up eliminating when I didn't think I had the time for extra applications, it looked like a great program though so good luck!

It looks like it is, accredited programs are required to post their student admissions data and Loyola posted that last year they received 25 applicants, had 4 accepted and all four of those enrolled.

Hey everyone, I'm really glad that I've finally found a community of people going through the same application process I am! I'm applying to six doctoral programs for this cycle in LSU, South Carolina, Maryland, Georgia, The Teachers College at Columbia, and Tennessee. I'm a bit worried that I didn't plan with safety schools enough but at this point I'm just glad that I've completed my first wave of applications