<p>Anyone out there planning on majoring in Psychology or currently majoring in Psychology?
A lot of my local colleges have some pretty....generic Psychology courses and I'm looking for more interesting classes since I plan to be a Psychologist and I don't want "basic" classes.
So far I've been impressed with Sarah Lawrence College's and Agnes Scott College's Psychology classes. Clark University's look good also. Does anyone recommend any colleges or univeristies with good Psychology courses?</p>
<p>I used to work with several PhD psychologists at a market opinion survey company. One of my colleagues had a degree from Clark. My understanding is that Clark has both a excellent program and reputation. My brother, another PhD psychologist, says that Minnesota and Iowa have two of the best psychology programs in the Midwest. In the interests of full disclosure, he received his degrees and taught at both.</p>
<p>Thanks for the info.
I found out about Clark on this Cosmogirl! College Guide thing and I checked it out. For a while it slipped my mind.
I've even researched a few graduate schools for Psychology. I don't know the names of them or anything but...I always have the tendency to look far ahead in the future.</p>
<p>"Basic" courses in psychology include intro, statitics, experimental design, developmental and personality to name a few are necessary to do well on the GRE Psychology exam if you plan to go to grad school. Evaluating undergrad programs in psychology should be based more on what type of applied and research opportunities there are for departmental majors, the quality of the faculty as measured by scholarly productivity and the overall quality of the college/university. You should not use rankings of grad programs to determine the quality of the undergrad programs at the same university--there is little relation between the two. You can check the American Psycological Association website, <a href="http://www.apa.org%5B/url%5D">www.apa.org</a>, for additional info about educational experiences in pscyhology. If you are thinking of becoming a clinical psychologist, try to make sure that you will have an opportunity to so some kind of research work with faculty at your chosen school. The competition for clinical psych grad programs is quite fierce and you will need research experience to be competitive at most programs.</p>
<p>psych is such a popular major that most schools will have at least a solid department. check faculty and course offerings to get a sense of what the department is like.</p>
<p>Hey Psych dbl-major here...
I would agree that most schools will have a strong program in Psych.
I would look at research opportunities and what they have on campus to really develop you toward your goals. Also, Psych is oftentimes a small major units-wise, so you might want to look at a possible minor or second major in a related field. (Comm comes to mind for a psychologist, or maybe even education...or business, depending on who you want to work with as a psychologist--clinical? school? organizational?)
Also, just a hint, don't tell people you "don't want basic classes" in your subject area! It's going to make you A LOT of enemies in high positions in academea (and even outside the academic world) if you do that!
Psychology is FAR too big a field to have specialty classes in every facet of (and expect all students to take every one of those specialty classes, at least), so classes like Gen Psych, Personal and Social Development, Human Growth and Development (or similarly named lower-division courses--sometimes referred to as "the psych triangle") help to give a brief introduction to the various topics in psychology. Saying you don't need those classes may make people think you're nothing but arrogant--and that's the last stigma you want surrounding your reputation in college! (or one of them! haha...there are definitely some others that will get you about as far)</p>
<p>Thanks for the tip. ;)
I've thought about minoring in LGBT studies but very few schools have a minor in it so... I'm not sure what my minor is going to be.
I want to specialize in adolescent psychology and/or LGBT relations. I plan on being a clinical psychologist. Thanks so much for the advice apumic.</p>
<p>Anybody have any suggestions regarding psychology programs in schools that might be more geared than others towards Psychology as a stepping stone for med school? Any schools that have combined 5 year Bachelors/Masters programs?</p>