<p>So I currently have a dilemma. I apologize that this is a rather long write-up.</p>
<p>Some background:</p>
<p>I am a Psychology major and Anthropology minor at a top 15 school. I am currently a senior. I am increasingly sure that I want to apply for a PhD program in social psychology, although I am planning on taking some time off after college. </p>
<p>I currently have a 3.46 GPA, which I am a bit worried about, since it is on the low side. I had a bad freshman year, although I have had good grades since then. I believe I should be able to raise that to over a 3.5 after this last semester, although I am worried about it still being a bit low.</p>
<p>I took the GRE in January, and I got a 170 Verbal, 161 Quantitative, and 5.5 Analytical score.</p>
<p>What worries me most is my research experience. I'll have 3 semesters of working as a research assistant after this year, and I helped out a bit last summer in a lab as well. I know research is the most important thing for an application. I don't have any publications or conferences, which worries me.</p>
<p>I have an offer from Teach for America and I would very much like to do that for the next two years, but I am worried about it not being directly applicable to PhD applications later and hurting my applications. It is something I would like to be engaged in, but I'm wondering if I should just do research instead. </p>
<p>Some caveats: TFA can involve a lot of data analysis, so that would be a good way for me to potentially practice some skills important to psychology. In addition, the summer is open during TFA, so I would consider during a research assistant job during that time.</p>
<p>Sorry for the long post, but I was wondering if anyone had any thoughts or advice.</p>
<p>As someone with a lot of friends doing the grad school grind now I can give you some advice.</p>
<p>170 on your GRE verbal? Amazing. Congrats. 161 Q is still good. Don’t worry about this. </p>
<p>Your gpa is a little on the low side but remember those are averages. That means that some people are below and above you…your GRe will help a little. I think with a 3.5 you should still apply. But this leads me to my next bullet.</p>
<p>Your psych major…is it a BS or a BA? What type of classes did you take? How much experimental/stat experience do you have? do you have any classes besides your minor that set you out? For example, I’m applying for behavioral neuroscience focused on possibly psychiatric disorders and I have a psych BS, Biology minor and a biopsych certificate. I molded my major and classes around what I wanted to do. I’m guessing your anthropology helps with that and has helped you throughout your degree; mention these things in your statement of purpose.</p>
<p>Your research experience is decent. Most schools want to know a) can you discuss something besides just the blurb on the website b) do you have experience and talent in the area/drive and dedication and c)do you have more than a year. Does your school provide research changes regularly or did you have to go out of your way to do it? This can factor slightly in or against your favor. Also you have a summer position which shows initiative. Most people don’t have publications or at least not 1st 2nd or 3rd author names. The conferences piece…i’ll discuss that in the next paragraph. </p>
<p>You’re a senior so it’s too late to apply for grad schools now but you can next cycle. i would suggest you take this summer and the remaining time you have and work in a lab. You can mention/have your PI write in their LOR that you’re going to continue working during this fall and the “off summer”. this will give you 5 semesters and you can maybe do a conference. These are important because they allow you to make connections, show your ability to talk in front of groups of people and other skills.</p>
<p>Your summer internship…where was it? Did you make a strong connection/end of good terms? If you did you should apply there. I’m not saying you’ll get in but having an in with a PI you worked with is amazingly helpful. </p>
<p>I would suggest not doing teach america…why? Because if you take a year off you can work 40 hours a week + probably get paid. If you do TFA you have to do 2 years and only your summers are free? that will look kinda odd in my opinion…only because I think they would wonder why you did TFA instead of school…and where your priorities lie. Plus only a summer wont allow you the deep connection you will want with a Lab PI.</p>
<p>Where do you want to apply? </p>
<p>TL;DR: work in a lab next year and apply during that next cycle.</p>
<p>Congratulations! I think your opportunity to do TFA for 2 years is a great one and given that you really want to do it I think you’ll find it can open doors later on as well as being a huge growth experience for you personally. One of my daughters was a corps member and whilst it was probably the most difficult thing she had ever done it was also the most rewarding. TFA is not for the faint of heart and that seems to be generally recognized. It will also give you something in your application and personal statement that sets you apart from other applicants, as well as real world experience which may influence and clarify your areas of interest for further study. I cannot see that it will hurt your chances of acceptance into a graduate program, especially if you are able to get some additional research experience during the summers. Depending on where you go for TFA you may also be able to complete a masters degree during your 2 years.
Your test scores are very good and your GPA is probably fine if you exclude freshman grades. Good luck with your decision!</p>
<p>Thanks for the advice! I really appreciate it.</p>
<p>In response to the first post:</p>
<p>I should have mentioned this, but I actually have an odd major. My school is the only one that offers it, but it is very popular here. I will have a BA in Philosophy-Neuroscience-Psychology.</p>
<p>In terms of stats, I have taken psych stats and experimental psych., but I guess that’s pretty standard. My neuroscience courses might set me out from the typical psychology major. </p>
<p>I go to a research university, so student research is pretty common here in psychology.</p>
<p>The summer research was at a university in my hometown. It was a good experience, but I wouldn’t say it a strong connection.</p>
<p>I’d like to apply to top 20 programs. I want to be somewhat ambitious, but also realistic, as well as find professors that I would like to do research with. </p>
<p>Also, this is something I’m somewhat unsure of. I had two summers of pretty intensive research in a biology lab in high school. I never really mention it since I assume people don’t care about high school experiences. However, I’m pretty sure I was doing roughly college level work in that lab. I don’t know if it would be helpful at all to mention it?</p>
<p>I had a 3.42 when I graduated from college, and I got into Columbia’s social psych program, which is where I am now. It is a bit low, but not so low that it will shut you out. Most undergraduates also do not have any publications, so don’t fret about that. It’s uncommon for people entering programs to have them. Conference presentations, however, are more common, so I would try to present at a regional or student conference if you have the opportunity.</p>
<p>TFA doesn’t involve data analysis. You are working as a teacher. They may do some anecdotal ‘analysis’ of their class’s grades or improvement, but you won’t actually be doing any quantitative data analysis as a teacher - not the kind that PhD programs would value. Also, I would not bank on getting a position as an RA over the TFA summers; you will likely spend that time revising your lesson plans and preparing for the school year.</p>
<p>So here’s my advice. Everything in your life doesn’t need to be geared towards getting a PhD. One of my regrets was that I didn’t take 2-3 years off to travel and maybe do a Fulbright or JET or something before entering my PhD program (I’m a 5th year). You won’t have that opportunity afterwards if you are serious about a career in academia, so reach for it now, while you can. If you really want to do TFA, do TFA! I can’t stress that enough. Do the things you want to do. Graduate school will always be here; it’s not going anywhere. You can go when you finish.</p>
<p>Then after you are finished doing TFA, you can beef up your research record. Often competitive candidates to social psychology programs have worked for 2 years as lab managers or research coordinators, so when you finish as a teacher you can do that. You may even find yourself working for ETS or ACT doing educational research analyzing test score changes over time or something. That would be awesome and applicable, and you’d likely get paid better than an RA. During this time, you should also take advanced statistics courses if you can find/afford them. If you are interested in experimental social psych, ANOVA/GLM is a good class to take. After 2 years of doing that, you will be competitive for a social psych program.</p>
<p>There are lots of students who come to PhDs after 2-4+ years out in the workforce. My program actually has fewer people who came straight from undergrad than we do people who pursued a master’s or did some research work or something else.</p>
<p>I was in a similar position as a senior. I was a psych major at Cornell with decent, but not stellar, research experience. I deferred TFA for one year so I could teach abroad for half a year and then return to my adviser’s lab for another half year. Then I matriculated into TFA. I’m now in my second year of teaching, but I’m also in the process of applying to social pysch PhD programs. The process is going well so far. </p>
<p>If you send me your e-mail address, I’d be happy to talk to you about my TFA experience as it relates to social psych grad programs.</p>
<p>As a start, juillet is right. The data analysis in TFA won’t help you in grad school. Rather, TFA has helped shaped my research interests.</p>