paraent

Mostly they present you an overview of the program and the department's assets. Ask questions if you're genuinely curious about something, though avoid negativity; they'll appreciate a good questions and would be probably annoyed by poor ones asked just for the sake of asking.

had 8 in one day

I had an interview last weekend for a cog psych/neuro program and it was far less intense and way more fun than I thought it might be. Don't get me wrong - it was exhausting (I spent all day meeting for 30 minutes each with different people), but in general I didn't feel like I was being looked at under a microscope or anything. The goal was just to have a good conversation with each professor and I just ran with that. I feel like the framework that we're going to be asked a bunch of job interview-esque questions is problematic, or at least not universally applicable. As long as you're ready to talk about your projects/experience and understand enough about your interviewer's work to ask interesting/well-informed questions about it, you're probably quite well-prepared for the interview.

Yeah, "fit" is the biggest metric for this process, even bigger than raw qualifications. Maybe your teachers were a bit overconfident this time around and this isn't usual but you...may want to seek out second opinions on some of these things the next time around? Clinical psych is one thing and research psych is another. Clinical psych seems to really value students having a strong foundation in basic psychology that can only come from high grades and coursework. If you do decide you want to do research instead though (and indeed you can even do clinical research without a hard "clinical psych" degree!), then building a base of research experience in psych is more definitively most important. I said what I said bc I'm not interested in clinical at all. No, not clinical sorry. I just wanna say again for anyone potentially on the fence between research and clinical careers, though! If it's easier for you to build a strong research background than it is to achieve optimal grades, you might have a much easier time applying for a non-clinical degree while *still* being able to do clinically important research! The admissions culture surrounding the two degrees are night-and-day different and it's arguably counterproductive that we're operating in the same subforum given how much advice gets shared without qualifying whom it's aimed at.

8 publications is practically unheard of before grad school, right?? Either clinical psych is just so crazy stats-focused that your GRE leaves you ineligible most places or there’s a problem with the kinds of PIs you’re picking or your approach to personal statements/LORs has some problem. If you’re just coming out of undergrad that might be a factor too I suppose. It seems likely that you can get a paid postbac position with the stats you have that can enhance your app, so maybe check those out and don’t worry about masters programs (I’d actually recommend avoiding masters programs to *anyone* who can snag a paid research position but maybe clinical psych really is just super stats-obsessed and this advise is only for people interested in research.) Anyway if anyone’s interested in BU’s timeline, BostonU extended an unofficial on-campus interview offer to me yesterday; official ones seem set to go out next week. Date is around March 9?

i just shared my pfsc archive with the pi im going to be interviewing with soon i just can't resist risky plays

Google scholar should be up to date imo. It happens automatically almost right as papers get published.

bzzt

i guess that means they're allowed to come in through the back door

I need to know which school :]

Looks like the Brown ship has sailed, hm.

Looking to hear about University of Virginia and Brown. Non-clinical. Anyone hear from either about an on-campus invite?

i forgot it was a weekday today such peace that i now get to be free of

ANOTHER DAY ANOTHER 1000 PEEKS AT MY EMAIL

thankfully, haha

mmm if your boss is a prof per se then you should just follow his lead if you're not in clinical, overall the admissions process is pretty individualized/people-focused and contacts w/ relevant profs in the labs you're interested in can pull quite a bit of weight am p sure one of my writers for instance directly contacted at least a couple of the POIs I was interested in working under; course this was a bit more than a month ago when the process was far less developed honestly this whole convo is giving me the feeling that maybe clinical and non-clinical psych applicants might do better with their own forums; there seems to be a really big divide in culture

reply all for sure

Be really careful though; while it's good to be clear about your interests to ensure you don't end up somewhere you'll be unhappy, if you sound too picky about which projects you're willing to work on, PIs might grow leery. Maybe use language like, "I'm excited about this and this and this; I'm *especially* interested though in this part of your work and am excited about the possibility of working with you on it", or something, etc.

I honestly don't think they're all that optional and would recommend conveying interest in any authentic-seeming way you can. I relate really hard with where you're coming from, but this is a high-stakes game, yknow?

Ah, interesting. Is this their first contact (like your first interview with them)? Just trying to get a sense of their timeline.

woah. what'd you hear?

Have a GPA around yours (lower than yours!) and lots of research experience and very good GREs. I'm applying to schools right now and have been seeing lots of success. So don't be so insecure about the GPA and focus on maxing out the other parts of your application. When the time comes to apply for graduate school, stick with labs that are doing really similar work to the stuff you've already done. Experience and lab match can get you really far in grad admissions.

Haha, but do grad programs really do that? Lab rosters always seem so, er, homogenous.

For anyone looking at Boston University: I only just now got approached for a skype interview for BU; this suggests that they're pretty early in their app cycle compared to other schools that are or have already sent out on-campus invites.

Think it's a question interviewers ask in general near the end of conversations.