RedBird

I don't envy you guys going through the application process during a global pandemic. I would like to ease your anxiety, if I can. Many programs, if not most programs, are taking longer to respond this year. There are COVID-related complications to contend with that impact any number of the processes attached to doctoral admissions. Please be gentle with yourselves! Your situation is unique and cannot be compared to past cohorts. 

Longtime lurker, but I wanted to add a note similar to what schizometric said. I had an informal interview, and the PI let me know that the school received a record-breaking # of applications and they're taking their time to do their due diligence. They are also facing some funding uncertainties (as you know, most programs confirm funding for xx # of years), so they want to make sure funding is still in place before proceeding with offers so their timelines will be delayed this year.
This is my first cycle and I know how stressful this all is - I hope we are practicing some healthy distancing from here and other online forums! I personally have been playing a lot of stardew valley to cope.

I totally get the PI's response as well, although that still leaves the applicant in something of a conundrum. If the PI ultimately needs someone with neuroimaging experience and you don't have it then...what? Sure, the conclusion is that you go get some, but it's not like it's a given you can easily just go get accepted for a position that will allow you to build that experience. It can be so difficult to get any RA job for some people, much less one that is perfectly modeled after your own interests. I think some PI's are more understanding, while others essentially expect to pick from the cream of the crop. Is the person who went to a SLAC any less inherently competent than the Ivy-league alum with lots of experience and pubs already earned by graduation? No, but realistically you're going to have a much harder time as the former. It honestly feels rather "sucks to be you then" sometimes. ?
 
Bah, don't get me started on this too...friends and family mean well, but sometimes their suggestions can leave you feeling a bit "wow thanks I'm cured!" This process can feel so incredibly isolating sometimes.

I'm sorry I had to say something but I can't believe there are people who are actually posting false interview invites. This is really unacceptable on so many levels. 

For all schools, if you don't receive an interview invite initially, it does not necessarily mean you are rejected. You are not rejected from any school until you receive an official rejection. Some programs send them out much earlier than others and some wait until after April 15. If you don't hear from a school, assume you are still on a list somewhere.  There is always a slim chance that programs/POIs go back to their shortlist if someone declines an interview, or even accepts an offer somewhere before other interviews have even taken place. This year is going to be even more unpredictable because applicants don't have to travel and cancel plans if they decide not to attend an interview or take an early acceptance somewhere. The wait is agonizing, but unusual things do happen sometimes!

Hey folks, 
With the understanding that not all folks within this forum are living in the U.S., I just wanted to share love and support for those who are challenged and impacted by the events occurring in DC. I hope everyone is finding a moment for wellness and respite right now. Please be kind to yourself, especially while we are still undergoing the admissions process amidst all of the madness. 
 

I haven't heard back either and am starting to feel the same at this point ?

ugh yall... i can feel that we're all really hard workers here. We all really deserve to be given the opportunity to pursue the dreams we've worked so hard for. I genuinely hope we all get admission from schools we'd be happy to attend ? rooting for us all

This is my first time applying, and I would also love advice from others with more experience!

What I noticed during a couple of my interviews last year was some interviewees constantly trying to be "impressive". PI's have already reviewed your application and already know you are qualified, now they just want to get to know YOU, as a person. Focus less on trying to be better than others or trying to prove why you deserve a spot. I recommend instead focusing more on trying to be your authentic self and everything else PsyDuck90 said. When I interviewed I made a document for each school I got an interview at and went through their website and their handbook and write down any questions I had: specific to the program, specific to the PI, specific to graduate student life, and specific to how they address social justice issues. I also added some of my key points I wanted to try and touch on during my interview with the PI (this was more to ease my nerves in case my brain went blank), such as my research interests and research ideas that could complement their line of research. I honestly had a great time during my interviews and I think a lot of it had to do with me just reminding myself that the hardest part was getting the interview, now it was more about getting to know me and about me getting to know them and how my quality of life would be if I were to get an offer. Also make friends with the other interviewees! They will eventually be your colleagues and you might see them at other interviews or future conferences.

1. Make sure you are prepared to discuss anything that's on your CV, especially any posters/presentations. So if you've got something that you presented a few years ago, make sure you refresh your memory. 
2. Be familiar with the current work your POI has put out in recent years. Make sure you have a pitch on what you can bring to their lab. Maybe have an idea or 2 for potential projects, just in case they ask. Why does their work interest you? What skills do you bring to the table? 
3. Be familiar with various aspects of the program overall. Have a good response if/when they ask why this program. Research match is 1 (very) important part of it, but what else about the program do you like? Are there particular practicum placement options you like? Are there specific course offerings that stand out? Outside of the standard curriculum required for APA accreditation that is. Reading through the student handbook (should be available online) is a really good way to assess program culture/policies/expectations/etc. 
4. Have questions. Have questions for your POI, as well as any other faculty, and any current students you may meet with. Make sure these questions aren't easily answered by reading the online written material or the handbook. Use the available information to craft questions that show you have spent time looking into this program and are invested in it. Don't be afraid to ask the same question to multiple people. You can also ask questions about the city/surrounding area, especially to current students. 
5. I cannot stress this enough. Be a person! You are not a robot with 0 personality. While you obviously want to remain professional, be you. You will be in this program for a minimum of 4-5 years. That means the faculty and other students will be engaging with you for a number of years. They are looking for capable, but they are also looking for people they can see themselves working with for 5 years. Being likable goes a long way. I just got my letters of recommendation for my next round of externship applications, and all my letter writers devoted the last paragraph to how likable and responsible and easy to work with I am. I don't think they all unanimously thought that was important to include by accident. People like working with people they like. Be natural and be you, since that's who you'll be for the foreseeable future.

Petition for that OP to hold an AMA here (assuming anything they've said is actually true ;)).
 

On the note of the results section: at what point does posting one's background stats go from "providing helpful info for future applicants" to "entitled"? I've wondered with a few posts...

One last thing...


Research Seminars and Meeting Visitors: My first year none of my cohort regularly attended our department's research seminar in which we invited high profile visitors to present their work. Big mistake. Yes first year is busy (I called it "First Year Grad Hell"), but this is an invaluable forum to network with the academic community you will be joining. If possible, read the paper thoroughly and have trenchant comment. If the department offers an option for informal grad meetings with the visitor, take it up even if the person is only within your broad subfield. You never know who will have an interesting insight on your project. The other advantages of these meetings is that different programs focus on different things in critiquing research and this is a good place to suss out what students at different schools are being told. This can be invaluable knowledge about the field come job talk time. Do be aware that these meetings can be incredibly awkward: it's not your fault. Academics are weird people and sometimes the conversation doesn't go well. I was really stressed about this and worried I had made a terrible impression on a very prominent member of my field. One of my advisers emailed me a few weeks later to tell me that he had actually brought up my research and was rather impressed. So awkward town does not mean that the meeting is a bust.

The one thing I've found very true for myself is that no matter how busy you are in the first year, it is by far the year with the most free time -- you're not fully involved in research yet, not thinking of prelims/quals, proposal, making the next paper deadline. Make the first out of the first year in terms of exploring the town/city/surroundings and meeting people! It's a lot harder to make time for that later.

1. I wish I would have fully grasped how busy I would become. It is so much more work than undergrad.

2. In that vein, I wish I would have done more prep work, gotten more freezer meals cooked and frozen before school started.

3. I got excellent advice from a friend: Set a time limit and don't go over it. Let's say it is 40 hours or 50 hours or whatever. When you reach it, STOP! Even if you haven't finished the reading. There are times when you have no choice and will have to break it, but try your best to stick to it.

4. Find a place you love and when it gets too much, go there and stay there until you have gained perspective. It could be the ocean, the forest, or our back yard.

5. EXERCISE! I have stayed sane by walking to school most days and taking walks with my husband at night. It gives us a chance to reconnect and let's me look away from the screen.

6. Learn to focus and cut out distractions. I installed Rescue Robot and it lets me know how long I have spent on each site and how productive I am. It is a free app and you can put it on multiple computers. I find it wonderful because so much of my time is spent on the computer or at home reading, so it is very easy to get sucked down rabbit holes. I have canceled my social media accounts as well, to cut down on mindless surfing.

7. Try to move to your new place early if you can. Having a couple weeks to settle, unpack, and get your bearings before you are hit with school is wonderful.

8. You will no longer be the smartest person in your class. Get over it. Also, don't be intimidated by other students. Remember they have had different training and preparation. One of the hardest things as a first year was to be thrown in a class with students who already have their master's and are studying for their qualifying exams. The only way I survived was that one of my classmates pointed it out to me and said to keep reminding myself of it.

9. One of my biggest breakthroughs this year has been learning to take criticism without automatically assuming it means I am stupid. Important lesson!

10. Have fun and remember you are in an incredibly privileged position. I think 5% of Americans have an advanced degree.

1. I wish I had known the first few months were going to be so expensive-- finishing up with moving costs, establishing the new place, the new computer, textbooks and school supplies, some new clothes, socializing with the cohort (bar costs!) and Christmas/holiday travel and gifts. Starting a budget earlier would have eased some of that post-Christmas money panic where I wasn't sure if my remaining income/stipend would yield enough savings for summer. Adding excess money worries to the already stressful life changes was unfortunate, so I recommend being honest with yourself, your income, and your expenses as they might play out over a long period of time (and not just month to month).

2. Time budgeting can be just as important as money budgeting. I was great about reading for the first four or five weeks, and then I slipped into the (very common) habit of only doing about half of the reading for any given class. It hasn't hurt my grades, but my choice to socialize or just take a lot of relaxation time at home has probably eroded some of the educational benefits of discussion and reading outside of my research for seminar papers.

3. Speaking of seminar papers and term projects: Start earlier than you ever have before. If you ever procrastinated on your big assignments in the past, this new time at school is the opportunity to break the habit and start treating these assignments like what they are: part of your job, and a stepping stone to your career. Waiting until the last week to research, or the last day to write, is something I see a lot of grad students still doing. Sure, plenty of them are doing okay in terms of grades, but they aren't doing their best work and-- let's face it-- we're getting too old for those late-night shenanigans.

4. Everyone knows you will be busy, so they might not say anything, but try not to lose contact with your friends and family from home. There will be plenty of new friends to be had, and starting fresh relationships can be liberating, but they likely won't be able to replace the deeper roots you've established elsewhere. Don't forget to call or write or facebook with the people who know you best.

I made some Grad School Resolutions last summer (the thread is still kicking around somewhere) about saying yes to invitations and being more positive, and I think that I held to them and they yielded some nice results. There are definitely some other things I might add later, but these are the first that come to mind.

I just had a preliminary interview today, so I don't think all official invites have been sent out yet

As far as I know, they've only sent out preliminary invites, but I don't think all PIs do this? I have a preliminary on the 4th and my POI will send out final interview invites on the 8th.

An informal interview and a pre-interview are the same thing. Some faculty reach out to speak with students before finalizing lists for invites to the formal interview day/weekend. 
Getting responses from 2 programs is great. It doesn't mean that you are accepted though. Do the interviews with the 2 schools and then if/when you get acceptances, that's when to worry about which program to pick. The interviews will be able to give you a much better idea of which program you prefer if given a choice. 

Procrastinating faculty member here :). I agree with the above, although I think this year we will cut you all some slack - we know that Zoom fatigue is real, and that being physically comfortable can help with that. I personally will be completely fine with a dress shirt or nice cardigan over a blouse, rather than a full blazer. To add, though, please consider taking some time to make sure your Zoom setup avoids some common problems. To wit:
1. The (other) halo effect. It's especially important during an interview to make sure that your face is adequately lit and that there isn't a strong light (sunny window or artificial lighting) behind you that makes you a silhouette. It's hard enough to get personality across via Zoom, and being able to clearly see your face helps a lot. No need for a fancy setup, just make sure to test your lighting at multiple points of the day and adjust accordingly.
2. Framing. This is tricky, I realize, but it's helpful for a lot of us to be able to view body language from more than just a disembodied head :). Think about the news anchor frame and try to approximate that. This also has to do with angles - if you're sitting directly in front of a laptop looking down (or up) at it, depending on the distance it can look like a looming face. Also test run your attire to make sure that the camera angle doesn't reveal anything you don't want it to reveal.
3. Eye candy. I don't judge anyone's Zoom space decor or similar (unless it is obviously inappropriate), however I have been distracted by items within view. So just check that your artwork, doodads, books, etc., are not distracting or overly cluttered, even if they're really cool. As with your professional attire, the goal is to make sure you and your ideas are the focus.
4. Props. Obvious prop placement, like making sure your copy of the DSM-5 or "Discovering Statistics Using R" is clearly viewable, are amusement-inducing, but not actually helpful. Also, many folks use their bookshelves as background - nice choice, but please make sure the titles are all appropriate, and that you don't inadvertently reveal an interest in some psychological area/approach that is inconsistent with the program to which you're applying. We can't help it - we WILL read legible titles.
5. Pets. I love 'em. Can't get enough of them, and to my mind pets are exempt from Item 2 above, but not sure everyone would agree. That said, we understand if you get a visit during our meeting :).
Thank you for your posts, all - I'm trying to anticipate applicants' anxieties so we can try to mitigate them during the interviews, and your opinions and questions are helpful. Good luck!

Is anyone else severely struggling a lot more than they thought they would with this process...? I was fine when I submitted them, and up to about two weeks afterwards, but I am not fine now! I am truly happy for everyone here and am excited for the next generation of mental health professionals and researchers. Yet I have 0 invites. I am trying not to get down, but I did not anticipate just how terrible I would feel for the holidays. My grad student mentor said to take time for myself and my family. It's hard  

Hey everyone! I just saw a post on SDN regarding apps this year from a faculty member. I’m going to copy and paste it here, but Here’s the link to the thread in case anyone’s interested.
“Happy holidays everyone! I’m back with some stats now that I have done a first pass on all my 2021 apps. I would say these are semi-final data as I am going to go back over things before I make interview decisions, but I wanted to at least lay eyes on all these apps before taking a break and I thought I'd share this info before the holidays in case anyone was lurking on SDN and looking for something to think about  .

Some background (hopefully sufficiently de-identified): I am junior faculty in a clinical psych PhD program at an R1 public university. The program has been APA accredited for longer than I have been alive and I think/hope it has a general reputation as being solid. Small cohorts, full funding, and no one hasn’t matched to an APA site in recent memory. We had 1 fewer person accepting apps this year vs last year and given the career stages/academic famousness () of who was and wasn’t accepting apps this year I would have expected a decrease in apps.

Overall apps were up around 50% over last year. I keep personal records on apps to my lab, so the stats below are only using those (i.e. not the full program), though I do get a disproportionate percentage of program apps (about twice what you'd expect just given # of apps/n of faculty accepting apps) so this is probably at least somewhat reflective of the pool in general. Comparisons between 2020 and 2021 assume that I am consistent in my ratings across years (which may not be correct given general 2020-ness and the big increase in volume, plus I refine my process each year I do this). Also, I should note a few people are represented in both samples because they applied to me both last year and this year, though may not have been rated the same because of changes on their end (e.g., more experience).

We use a rubric to score apps. The range for app rubric scores in typical years is roughly -20 to +30. We included points for GRE scores last year but did not accept GREs this year so I tried to correct for that by adding mean 2020 GRE points to the total 2021 rubric numbers. This is imperfect, but seems better than nothing re: comparing samples and I can’t get into a major deep dive on this right now ?. Providing a few stats that were easy to compile and seemed meaningful, plus an overall indication of the competitiveness of each pool (total rubric scores).

2020
29% with masters
33% with postbac/master’s paid research experience
13% other than non-Hispanic white
Undergrad GPA M = 3.7
Rubric points for research experience M = 2.4
Total scores on rubric M = 12.3 (for reference, the M for people I interviewed was 22.3)

2021
30% with masters
18% with postbac/master’s paid research experience
39% other than non-Hispanic white
Undergrad GPA M = 3.7
Rubric points for research experience M = 1.9
Total (adjusted with 2020 GRE M) scores on rubric M = 7.9

My takeaways, both from my app review experience and these data, indicate a higher proportion of applicants who identify as something other than non-Hispanic/Latinx white (seems good!) and also those with less research experience (less good!) this year. In fairness, I think I was harder on rating letters than I was last year in an effort to try to separate the rock stars from the generally good apps. This may have depressed total scores a little, but the research experience points and % with post-degree research employment are objective data points that point to a legitimate shift. I did not get a single app that I would classify as "I was a psych major and am now unemployed so I'll try to go to grad school" as we had hypothesized. Rather, I saw more people who were current undergrads and/or master's level clinicians who maybe had some research experience but not enough to be competitive for my lab. I get applicants like this every year, but I think there was more growth in apps from this segment than others. I did also see growth in solid applicants with great research experience, so just more of everything.

Not sure if this helps applicants feel any better- I would say that the pool is not saturated entirely with more super qualified apps, but also that it doesn't seem to be all noise either. Interested to hear what people think, and I'm happy to answer questions (within the bounds of maintaining my anonymity and not being too detailed about specific applicants or internal program processes).”

Hi! First time posting here and first time applying to grad school! I am hoping someone can help me interpret this situation... I applied to PhD clinical psych programs.
I had a preliminary zoom interview (30 min) with my top choice school, but I realized that the PI did not ask me any questions about my research interests. They complemented my CV and my experience and called it impressive. Said my Letters of Rec were really great and that I am "high up on the list." We talked about personal interests (I played a sport in school and they thought that was cool). The PI otherwise told me about their program of research, the structure of the lab and goals for the lab. I asked a current grad student, who was also present, about mentorship style and current projects they are working on. The interview ended with mention that the PI would follow-up in mid-January about formal interview offers and continued to complement me. But I am worried that we never really dove into my personal research interests (they are closely aligned with the PI's) or skills. They never asked....Is that a bad sign? Should I have brought up my interests or skills or how I can help the lab? Should I have asked more specific questions about their research? I know there were otherwise a lot of good things to take away from the interview - but it seemed very "get to know your personality" instead of "get to know your research interests and if you can think like a researcher," which is not what I was expecting. I just don't know how to interpret this. Are prelim interviews supposed to be about past achievements and personality, or research interests and goals? Is this normal? If I do get a formal interview invite, I will be sure to emphasize my interests and skills and ask more questions. Just a lot of nerves as this is my #1, and the only pre-interview I've had!
Also, the PI replied to my thank you email saying that they look forward to following up with me re next steps. Not sure if that means anything or if people say that all the time. I could be overthinking things a lot here, but I don't know I've never done this before. Thanks in advance for your thoughts!

I would probably take the CUDCP information with a grain of salt, I haven't seen too many programs list actual interview notification deadlines and those that do don't always stick to them.