Jordyn_M463

When I applied last year, I sent mine in without my official transcript and LORs. I would say send it with as much completed as you possibly can. But if it something that takes time, it should be fine. It didn't affect my acceptances.

Its definitely not weird! I gave mine little hand written notes thanking them and mugs full of candy.

I dont know where you are located but Edinboro University (Pennsylvania) gives all first year grad students a GA position. It covers 3/4 of your tuition and you get paid biweekly. 13.5 hrs of work a week. I am sure there are other programs that offer these positions as well. I just thought it was nice that all students get offered this their first year.

Agreed with above. As long as there is no identifying information about the client (name/DOB/address/etc) you are fine to talk about it.

I would agree with the above posts. You will probably have to just do some serious research. I would narrow it down to cost and distance you are willing to travel. Then look at schools you would be interested and their prerequisites. As for "safe environment", if you are meaning the area the school is located thats something that you can also research. As for toxicity in the actual program between cohorts/professors/faculty, that really isn't something that can be screened for unless you know people in the program. You could maybe ask people their opinions/experiences on specific programs. I am sure there are people out their willing to give you their honest opinions.

I ran out of willing professors to write my letters. I didn't have a huge connection with a lot of them because the classes were 100+ students. I asked my boss from my job. She had nothing to do with SLP or CSD but she knew me well and knew my work ethic. I know some people suggest not doing this, but I was accepted into almost all of the schools I applied to. In my case, it definitely did not hurt my chances. I just sent her a little bit about school and what the different schools were looking for. Then I sent her my statements of purpose and any essays I had written. I think that helped her formulate a letter that highlighted things I wanted to stand out in my application. Best of luck!

I know for my program our medical placements will be 4-5 days a week, working the same shifts as our supervisors. Depending on the hospital/facility we get placed in, we may also have to stay a few extra weeks because that is what the hospital requires. Unfortunately, I don't think the long hours are that uncommon, although it does suck he will be taking class on top of that. Another possibility could be, since he is in his second year he will be trying to complete the minimum number of clinical practicum hours needed for graduation and certification. I know that we were told that it would be like working a full time job, so that we were sure we would not be under the minimum or cutting it close. Best of luck to him and your family!

I was asked questions about my personality. Strengths, weaknesses, why would I be a good SLP/grad students. As well as questions about the importance of diversity and whether I had experienced diverse populations. It wasn't anything about "here is a scenario, what kind of treatment would you implement." They were all very broad questions trying to "get to know you as a person". I think the biggest thing is, can you interact with other people without it being awkward and uncomfortable. I wouldn't stress too much about it. I would also have a few questions to ask them about their program. They should give you an opportunity to ask them questions. I would ask about how many clinical placements you get and how they are assigned. Do you have to find them yourself or does the program help connect you to good sites? What does the class schedule look like? Are their GA positions available? Is the school research oriented or clinical based? Those are all questions you will probably want to know to help you make a final decision in the end. Your grad school experience will really differ depending on the answers to those questions. This is obviously all in my own experience. This could differ for other people. Good luck!

Here are some tips I was given in undergrad: Forget about everything you bragged about in high school. Only include what happened in your undergrad unless it was something so significant. It doesn't have to be "basic". It should match your personality and have some flare but should be easy to read and not cluttered. If something isn't relevant and doesn't fit, don't include it. Highlight skills you have learned through your experiences that would be what they are looking for in a grad program. All this being said, don't fret too much about it. Look up a template online and honestly just follow it. I would have a professor (I asked my English professor) look over it for you. They might be able to eliminate wordiness and give you additional tips to making your resume stand out. Your resume isn't the only thing. My resume was probably pretty lackluster compared to some but here I am, in my first year of grad school. You could always go to the career services (or something equivalent) if your school offers it. Professors are also a good resource considering they have probably updated their own resumes a million times! Best of luck! Don't stress too much about this one piece of paper!

I am in Western Pennsylvania. I applied to Clarion, IUP, Edinboro, Penn State, Cal U (all PA schools). I applied without any CSD professors as LORs (not from lack of trying) and was still accepted. My suggestion: if you can't get CSD professors, apply anyway. I honestly think it is a "strong suggestion". For out of field applicants especially, don't let it deter you from applying. Apply anyway.

It is interesting to hear what kind of work your program has! So far, I have written 0 papers haha. We had to do a 2 page info/fact sheet on different special populations (Fragile X, Down Syndrome, ASD, cochlear implants, etc). Then we are going to take the entire cohorts populations and put them into binders so that we can have them to refer to when we are practicing clinicians. I found this specific project to be pretty helpful. My very first exam was an oral exam. We had to create a 3D model of the larynx and prove that we knew all the cartilages, bones, muscles, nerves and how they functioned by labeling, drawing and discussing in a one on one session with my professor. I stressed super hard over this but it was surprising how smooth it went and how thankful I was when it was over to know the fundamentals of the larynx, considering it is such a huge component of our practice. I have a few other pending projects and assignments, but I think because my school is not research oriented at all, we aren't really given many research papers. It is more practicum based. Get in there and play with assessment tools and therapy equipment, which I actually enjoy. I am absolutely terrible at anything research haha. I know that other programs have 30 page papers due in every class they take. So I think it really depends on the program. If this is something you are concerned about, I would maybe find some students who go there, or look to see if the school is research or practicum based. I would say a lot of larger schools with more money have the funds and people to do research but that is not always true.

So I would second the person above. The varied deadlines (ie. December, January, February) are when you need to pay that application fee for that school by. It would be safe to assume that everything else needed for your application, (LOR, letter of intent, transcripts, etc) should also be in by the time you pay that application fee. In your case, all of that important supplemental information would already be in there if you have a deadline of December. I would recommend then that is the deadline you give yourself. My advisor in undergrad said to aim for the end of Thanksgiving break. With that being said, my transcripts were not verified by my deadline on CSDCAS, but that did not hurt my acceptance chances. I was still accepted into the school. But, early is always best!

Also a first year grad student! I will give my experience so far, as everyone's experiences and programs seem to really differ. Classes: Monday/Wednesday: 8-9:15 & 9:30-10:45 Tuesday/Thursday:9:30-10:45 & 11-12:15 Fridays are free. Sometimes we have conferences and meetings and other things scheduled for that day but very rarely. All first year grad students are offered a graduate assistantship. If you choose to accept it, you create your own work schedule with your cohort. We are required to work 202.5 hours/semester (13.5hrs/week). We get paid $7.50/hr and get 3/4 tuition reduction. I personally do not have a second job, but many in my cohort do. They seem to be handling it well for now. We do not start clinic rotations until second semester. Their philosophy is that we should know the basic fundamentals for the broad areas first. Clinic is in the afternoons/evenings Monday-Thursday. Occasionally we will get special clients that will be different depending on the supervisor as our on-campus clinic does not bill for services. There is one special case where a client is coming in on Friday mornings for voice therapy for instance. Second semester we will have classes in the late mornings/early afternoons and then see our clients in the evening as well as work our GA positions so things are going to get more hectic. Right now, I feel like I have a lot of free time. I know that is not the case for a lot of programs, but it is actually pretty nice. I think it has helped me ease into grad school. We will be starting to do hearing screenings and speech/language screenings here in late October. We will also be attending meetings with the second year grad students to discuss their clients and their therapy techniques. Then we will be shadowing and working with a second-year to ease into seeing clients. At the end of the semester we will be attending "clinic bootcamp" to get us ready for clinic next semester. Some additional things to think about: My program pays the fee for all of us to get all of our clearances and our CPR certification. This is an expense that would otherwise come out of our pockets if we didn't already have these clearances. They also pay for our subscriptions to SimuCase and Praat and other databases that will be using. Which would be another expense we would have to pay for out of pocket. Our clinical rotations are as such: On-campus clinic second semester, external placement over the summer, on campus clinic 2nd fall, and 2 external placements in the 2nd spring semester. You get to pick your location and put down a preference as to where you might want to be. Then the program director pretty much finds you a place so you don't have to worry about it. That whole process is pretty stress free. That is something I like about my program. They worry about everything for you, and will let you know if there is ever a time you actually need to worry. As for social life: I would say in my program at least, the weekends are always free to go out and socialize. We always make sure we have everything we need to get done, done by Friday afternoon. Then a lot of us get together Sunday evenings at the clinic and finish up anything that hasn't been completed. Its been almost 2 months and I would say every weekend my cohort is together (or at least most of us). This is all subject to change. Things are bound to get more difficult and hectic when clinic starts. But I would honestly say, it is not as stressful as you may think. I went in thinking I would have no free time, no social life, and spend most of my time with my nose in a book. This is not the case for my program at least. We are slowly being eased into the life of grad school and I can honestly say things are pretty good so far! Please message me if you have any questions! Best of luck to all of those applying!

I would suggest retaking it if your quantitative score is very low. I can't say for sure that it would hinder you from being accepted but it is best to try to raise the score to be sure.

If it has been a long time, maybe call them. Mine took around a month to be finally entered on the CSDCAS application site. That being said, it was past the application deadlines as well. It didn't hinder my chances of getting into grad school. Everything else was on CSDCAS on time and I paid the fees before the deadline and I was fine.