Considering the quality/amount of clinical training offered by a program

[biogirl215]

I'm choosing between two PhD programs (so far, anyway). Both have high match rates to APA-accredited internships, but one program has much stronger clinical training in terms of experience (4 years of practica pre-internship v. 1 year of pre-practica in the school clinic and 2 years of practica pre-internship) . Research opportunities are pretty equal at both. I am still getting the funding details hammered out, but it looks like funding may be somewhat better at the school with less clinical training. I want a balanced career with both research and practice components, and it worried me that one of more advanced students said he didn't think that his clinical training was necessarily the best, even though he still matched at a well-regarded site, while students at the program with more tclinical training all spoke EXTREMELY well of their training.

With match becoming all the more competitive, getting good clinical AND research training is important to me, but if both programs historically match well, should this be that much of a concern?

Thanks!

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[LM02]

If both schools' match rates are similar, I wouldn't be too concerned from a practical perspective. But I still think it's an important thing to consider, based upon what YOU want for your training and career.

Some other things to consider:

1. Quantity and quality of clinical training is not always the same.

2. Some of the "better" internships actually take people with fewer clinical hours (relatively speaking) because they are looking for people who are more interested in pursuing research careers. They're not necessarily weeding people with a lot of clinical hours out, and having a lot of hours wouldn't necessarily hurt you. But it may be that students are matching at strong programs at school #2 because of their research experience. With that said, if they were not properly trained clinically, all the research in the world will probably not make up for that (with some rare exceptions).

 

[researchgirl]

I would also say that for a clinical program to start practica their 2nd year is pretty standard, so the school with 1 year in their clinic + 2 years in other sites is very "normal" - so you'd easily be competitive for internship, etc.

The better question might be which types of practica opportunities are available at the schools - if the school has the types of opportunities you are interested in, that is more important than the number of opportunities/number of hours you can gain.

Also, if students told you they were unhappy with the clinical training, it might be worth following up with an e-mail about what they like/dislike about the training in order to clarify!