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Originally Posted by 4410
To state that 14 PsyD and one PhD programs are the problems is just plain ignorance because there are many more factors that are not controlled and the APPIC Match information is not a factual or accurate representation of empirical information but primarily collateral information.
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Not really, this view has been supported in the literature. It's clear that reducing the number of less desirable applicants for internship would reduce the overall demand which would relieve much of the stress on the system. There are several programs that are contributing to the problem and are generating future clinicians at a pace that the available internship resources cannot handle.
The problem is two fold.
1. Generating applicants that are not competitive for internship.
2. Generating applicants in excess of what can be supported by the available resources for continued training.
In both cases, schools that generate high numbers of less desirable applicants to internships are responsible for this problem. It would be less clear if these clinician assembly lines were producing highly competitive candidates in vast numbers, but they are not. Certainly, I am not maligning individuals who attend these programs, because I have met very talented graduates from every program, but we have to look at the overall outcomes from these programs and not just the exceptional individual who may happen to shine when graduating from one of these 15 programs. If these 15 programs alone did not graduate students there would be several hundred less applicants fighting over the same number of slots. Stating that this is not a significant part of the problem is rubbish. Are there other problems, yes, of course there are, but this is the low hanging fruit on the tree.
Clearly these 15 programs (as well as all programs) have a responsibility to do the following:
1. Ensure they are generating competitive applicants.
2. Ensure that accredited internship opportunities exist for their applicants.
M