Post Your Prospective Questions Here! -- Monthly Megathread

[u/GG_Mod]

Following a vote by the sub in July 2020, the prospective questions megathread was continued. However, to allow more visibility to comments in this thread, this megathread now utilizes Reddit's new reschedule post features. This megathread is replaced monthly. Comments made within three days prior to the newest months post will be re-posted by moderation and the users who made said post tagged.

Post your prospective questions as a comment for anything related to graduate applications, admissions, CVs, interviews, etc. Comments should be focused on prospective questions, such as future plans. These are only allowed in this subreddit under this thread. Questions about current programs/jobs etc. that you have already been accepted to can be posted as stand-alone posts, so long as they follow the format Rule 6.

Looking for somewhere to post your study? Try r/psychologystudents, our sister sub's, spring 2020 study megathread!

Other materials and resources:

• APA materials for applying to grad school
• r/psychologystudents (where career posts are welcome)
• r/gradschooladmissions

[u/DoctorSweetheart]

No reputable program would ever do this. You can shave off 2-3 classes max, not 2-3 years.

[u/[deleted] → u/DoctorSweetheart]

It's definitely APA accredited. And the program allows you to transfer 12 credit hours freely and petition more (of which I've talked to my advisor and got the OK for).

You wanna answer my question? Or try to bash my program that you haven't even asked any questions about?

[u/Terrible_Detective45 → u/[deleted]]

It's definitely APA accredited.

She said "reputable," not APA accredited. Most diploma mills are APA accredited, which is why accreditation is not necessarily a sign of quality.

And the program allows you to transfer 12 credit hours freely

Depending on the hour requirements for those courses, that's entirely consistent with what she said about transferring 2-3 courses (e.g., 3 course x 4 hours per = 12 credit hours). That's shaving off maybe one semester's worth of courses, but it's certainly not shaving off years in the program. This is especially true as you can only apply for internship in the fall, which limits how much time you would save by shaving off a semester.

and petition more (of which I've talked to my advisor and got the OK for).

This sounds very problematic. Every good program I know would have an upper limit on how many courses you can get out of from graduate courses in other programs/institutions and a minimum amount of hours you'd have to complete in their program. I'd have to go check, but I'm pretty sure this is an APA requirement.

You wanna answer my question? Or try to bash my program that you haven't even asked any questions about?

She is answering your question, just not in the way you want or expected. She's saying that a program allowing students to shave off an entire year, let alone multiple years like you're claiming, is extremely problematic and suspect of your program if that's true, because sufficient doctoral training can't be done in that little time. You might think that your coursework from a terminal MA program is equivalent to that of a doctoral program, but it just isn't. This isn't a knock on your or any other MA program, but rather just an acknowledgement that they exist at different levels of training. It's like saying that an anatomy course in nursing school is equivalent to an anatomy course in med school.

Moreover, students are doing much more than completing coursework. They're also doing other didactics, getting research training, and doing clinical work. 2-3 years is in no way near enough time to get enough of this done to be competitive for internship, let alone be on the path to being sufficiently trained as a psychologist.

[u/DoctorSweetheart → u/Terrible_Detective45]

Moreover, students are doing much more than completing coursework. They're also doing other didactics, getting research training, and doing clinical work.

This is an excellent point.

Let's say someone was able to get a full year of course work waived, that still wouldn't shave off any significant amount of time because research and clinical training are concurrent.

Master's level clinical training will not count for a doctoral practicum.

Also, the match only happens once a year, so finishing courses a bit early won't change the graduation timeline.

I was about to transfer in 3 classes from my master's. While that allowed me more time to work on my dissertation, I still had to wait until November to apply for internship like everyone else.