Help Determining which program to choose!

[Guest joshw4288]

A bit about my background first:

I am graduating in May 2012 with a BA in Psychology and a BS in Exercise and Sports Science and a minor in history from Texas Tech University. My cumulative GPA is 3.65, Psy GPA: 3.93, and ESS GPA: 3.82. I have a year of research experience on an interpersonal violence project in which I carried out the entire project from start to finish and presented the results at the Southwestern Psychological Association conference and our Texas Tech Undergraduate Research Conference. I also have 1 semester of research experience only collecting data on a project involving judgments, affordances, and robot capabilities. My GRE scores are 160 verbal, 157 quantitative, and 4.5 writing.

I applied and was denied by 6 PhD programs. All were excellent programs and admitted 5% or less of applicants. I have been admitted to The New School for Social Research Psychology MA, Hunter College (CUNY) Psychology MA and University of Texas-San Antonio Psychology MS.

From my research advisors point of view, the NSSR program is my best option because of its progression into the NSSR PhD program and The New Schools good social science reputation. On the other hand, another advisor of sorts who is a very renowned research psychiatrist believes that UTSA is ideal with Hunter coming behind that.

Here are the differences:

The New School certainly has the best reputation of the three. Negatives about the program are that it is very content based. There is only 1 required statistics/research methods course. There are no funded TA or RA positions for masters level students and with 70 students admitted to the MA each year, I imagine even the volunteer research opportunities are limited. Only 15 of each 70 applicant class gets the opportunity to engage in a Masters thesis and only 4-5 per year will be admitted to the Social Psychology PhD program.

Hunter College also does not require much in the way of Statistics/Research Methods but it does offer funded opportunities for MA students to be RA's. If a funding opportunity is not available, you can at least get on as an unpaid assistant in doing research. It also requires a masters thesis for graduation.

UTSA is probably a relatively unknown program outside of Texas. It is an MS rather than an MA and has a required core curriculum of 3 statistics classes and 2 research methods classes followed by required research assistantships and a required masters thesis along with 3 (9hrs) of content courses.

I am having a hard time deciding between the research/statistic focus of UTSA, required thesis, and guaranteed RA (not necessarily paid), with the considerably more recognizable MA from NSSR despite the lack of research focus. Hunter seems to be somewhat in the middle, lacking in research/statistical focus, but requiring a thesis and considerably more opportunities for research.

My goal is to complete one of these programs and then reapply to PhD programs. Any comments/personal experience stories are welcomed.

Thanks

[pcon]

Congratulations!

I have also been accepted to the NSSR MA in Psychology and am waiting to hear back from Hunter- do you mind me asking when you heard back from them?

[Guest joshw4288]

Congratulations!

I have also been accepted to the NSSR MA in Psychology and am waiting to hear back from Hunter- do you mind me asking when you heard back from them?

I received my "unofficial" acceptance to Hunter when I called and asked. Technically it is an unofficial acceptance as the official acceptances have not been decided upon yet. The woman I spoke to said the official decisions will not go out until late May...

[pcon]

Thats brilliant, you must be delighted! The lack of a thesis for the NSSR program threw me a bit too, and the research labs in Hunter look great. Although, everytime I speak to someone in the NSSR offices they are so helpful and friendly that I get more attached each time! It's infuriating that it takes so long to hear back tho- I'm trying not to look in too much detail at Hunter until I hear. Did they just offer up the unofficial decision pretty easily when you called admissions?

[Guest joshw4288]

Thats brilliant, you must be delighted! The lack of a thesis for the NSSR program threw me a bit too, and the research labs in Hunter look great. Although, everytime I speak to someone in the NSSR offices they are so helpful and friendly that I get more attached each time! It's infuriating that it takes so long to hear back tho- I'm trying not to look in too much detail at Hunter until I hear. Did they just offer up the unofficial decision pretty easily when you called admissions?

The graduate office gave me the unofficial decision over the phone. I received my official decision two days ago so you should be receiving it soon. I'm just having a hard time getting past the idea of no thesis and and a program of about 300 graduate students compared to 75 at Hunter. 300 students obviously cannot get research positions...Hunter seems like it will be much more personal and I get the idea that NSSR just admits everyone that is willing to pay.

[rockandroll]

The graduate office gave me the unofficial decision over the phone. I received my official decision two days ago so you should be receiving it soon. I'm just having a hard time getting past the idea of no thesis and and a program of about 300 graduate students compared to 75 at Hunter. 300 students obviously cannot get research positions...Hunter seems like it will be much more personal and I get the idea that NSSR just admits everyone that is willing to pay.

I got the same impression of NSSR and decided not to go. I received a 50% scholarship, which seemed like one of the bigger ones that they gave out, but I ended up turning them down because after doing some research, it seemed like their incoming class sizes were enormous. I felt like I would get a much more personalized experience at another school, and also, the cost of attendance (even with the scholarship) in combination with the price of living in NYC would just be too much for me. Another huge thing that I took into consideration: They don't guarantee funding to their Ph.D. students, which I knew would matter to me in the long run. The program that I accepted guarantees full funding for five years!