Psych Programs!

<p>I live in the North East and am looking for the best undergraduate psych program I can find. I am looking in states like MA, NY, or PA.
I'm planning on going into clinical psychology so i need a really strong start at a school known for psychology. I'm already very interested in Clark University but I need at least one other to apply to.</p>

<p>Columbia, Penn, Cornell?????</p>

<p>Yale is also good for clinical psych. Princeton, Brown, Johns Hopkins, NYU, Tufts, U of Rochester. Good LACs include Amherst, Williams, Wesleyan, Bucknell, Gettysburg, Haverford, Vassar, Swarthmore, Lafayette.</p>

<p>Its a good idea to take lots of math and biology, maybe dual major and minor, to distinguish yourself from the masses of other psych students. </p>

<p>What are your SAT scores?</p>

<p>I know it's not in the northeast, but if want the best of the best, go to stanford</p>

<p>Your best preparation for getting into a clinical psych grad program is making sure that you have the opportunity to participate in psychological research as an undergraduate. When you are looking at schools find out what opportunities exist for undergraduate participation in the research activies of the faculty. Does the college provide paid summer research opportunities on campus or does it have a good track record of placing student in national summer research programs? Of the senior psych majors over the past few years what percentage of them had authorship of either conference presentations or publications? Grad schools are looking for applicants who have worked closely with faculty in research. As the content and course offerings are relatively similar from school to school, overall academic strength of the college and of your preparation as well as GRE scores are of primary interest to clinical psych programs. By the way research in clinical psych is less important than good research experience in any area of psychology. While some math background is helpful, statistical expertise would be more valued. Double majors add little to the strength of your application. Good luck.</p>

<p>connecticut college frequently sends students to top psych programs</p>

<p>Psych grad programs generally teach their own statistics courses. Stat is the downfall of many psych grad students who often get interested in psychology because of their people-skills and have little or no interest in math. Math through calculus will help you understand statistics at a higher level, not just an algebraic understanding. Matrix algebra and linear algebra are useful. Knowledge of information technology is useful. data management, and programming higher level software such as SAS and SPSS and Minitab. Computer skills are a definite plus.</p>

<p>Biology is also a weakness in many applicants to grad programs in clinical. Clinical psych is closely involved with medicine and psychiatry. Clinical psychologists work in conjunction with psychiatrists (MDs). A knowledge of neuroanatomy and organic chemistry (or at least a knowledge of how psychiatric medicines work) is useful for being a clinical psychologist. Mental illness is almost always a biological/medical problem at some level. Most of the recent advances have been medical, not psychological (this is what I am told).</p>

<p>In the social sciences, a knowledge of experimental and quasi-experimental design is important but Psych Depts usually teach that themselves, from what I am told.</p>

<p>If you don't like the research and statistics, there is a PsyD degree which is more applied in nature.</p>

<p>Psychology is a very common major and clinical is the most popular specialty. Clinical PhD programs are more competitive than med school. You should do something to set yourself apart, to make your profile distinctive. Math and bio will help you be a better Clinical Psychologist/researcher.</p>

<p>I got 610 on Reading
570 on Math
and 600 on Writing</p>

<p>I just took them for the 2nd time so I should be getting my scores tomorrow. They should go up quite a bit since I took it the first time with no preparation at all and I left a lot of Math blank, which I didn't do this time around.</p>

<p>I want somewhere competitive but not Ivy League, mostly because I probably couldn't get in. I didn't take SAT II's so schools requiring those are out of the picture. I'm 33/277 in class rank and my GPA is 92.87 weighted, with acc./honors/AP classes. I want somewhere that'll show how hard I worked in high school, but not make college unbearable.</p>

<p>Oh, and I'm actually taking UCONN Statistics next semester. I'm taking Acc. Pre-Calc now for the year.</p>