OP, most good schools are going to have good solid psychology programs/departments. You don’t need to go somewhere that has the most cutting-edge psychological research; you just need to go somewhere they are doing some kind of good-quality research so you can get some practice/exposure and develop relationships with professors. There are tons of them on the East Coast:
-Small liberal arts colleges are a great suggestion. Because they are smaller and don’t have grad students, you can form more intimate relationships with professors and often end up doing assistant work that would normally go to a junior grad student. At the very tippy top liberal arts colleges (places like Amherst, Swarthmore, Williams, Bryn Mawr, Wellesley, Smith, etc.) the professors got their PhDs and research training from the same kinds of places as the researchers at Harvard, Yale, Princeton, Stanford, etc. The major difference is they wanted to teach and work with undergrads. These professors also teach 2 classes a semester and devote a hefty chunk of their time (~50%) to doing research. So there will be plenty to join in on.
-However, medium-sized to big research universities can also be a fine place to get your undergrad education! It’s true that at universities professors have grad students, but that doesn’t mean they don’t bring on undergrads - they usually do, and often a lot of them. That’s because these professors usually have big research agendas that require many hands! At universities, usually the grad students and postdoctoral fellows mentor the undergrads, so it may take a little more work to get close relationships with the professors themselves - but it can be done.
I have a PhD in psychology and have many friends who do, and we went to all kinds of places for undergrad: public flagships, regional publics, small liberal arts colleges, big prestigious universities, everything in between.
One pro tip/differentiator is, if you can, it’s nice to go to college in a town with a couple hospitals with mental health clinics/wards/whatever. The best clinical applicants not only have research experience but also experience volunteering with psychologists or other mental health professionals. The university doesn’t have to have its own hospital or clinic at all - just having one nearby where you can volunteer is useful.
Good clinical psychology PhD programs are fully funded - your tuition and fees are paid and you receive a modest stipend to cover living expenses. It’s good to keep undergrad costs low in general, but it’s not like medical school where you’ll be borrowing the full cost of attendance (unless you go get a PsyD, which I would not recommend).
Nothing wrong with the SUNYs - there are several at which you can get a great undergrad experience. A close friend of mine from my PhD program got her BA at Stony Brook.
This is NOT true. Clinical psychology is just the opposite - the programs are SO competitive that the best candidates usually have 2+ years of research experience in undergrad (so they started doing research their junior or even sophomore year), and often they have 1-3 years of research experience post-college as well - working as a lab manager or research assistant in a psychology or other social science lab. A clinical psychology hopeful with no research experience will not be competitive for PhD programs in the field.
Well, you don’t have to, but it does make you a lot more competitive and many of the best clinical psych PhD applicants have done so. But it is also possible to go straight into a PhD program in clinical psychology, although it’s less common these days than it used to be.
