dilemma

[marissaleigh77]

I have a similar situation to someone who posted yesterday... any help would be really appreciated, as I have to make a really hard decision.

I applied to 10 clinical programs and 1 Neuro/Cognitive and though my GREs and background is extremely strong, and I have research experience for 2+ years, my exp. is not directly related to the pop/type of research I want to do. That being said, I have 3 options...

1. Clinical program, excellent match research wise; middle range school (depending on the list you look at... prob 20-30 ish school), great match with advisor- personality and work-wise, very undesirable location

2. Neuroscience program- great research match, great location, funded, top 10 school, but isnt clinical ...they assured me that I can take assessment courses, but I will not be able to do any practica ...
I do not want to have a practice and want to remain in academia and do research, but the clinical PhD will allow me access to a population and a non-clinical will be somewhat limiting....
The Neuro program is in every other way a great fit, but will limit my options post-degree. I was really looking forward to the diagnosis aspects of a clinical program...

3. since I have obvious things I can do to enhance my apps for next year, I have several prospective research and clinical job opportunities...
Should I role the dice again (with significant additions to my applications.. i.e.authorship, independent project, work directly with clinical populations in my field, better Recommendations)
I am very ambivalent about turning down offers in order to risk everything and perhaps not get any the next go-round, but I feel very strongly (and was told by professors) that I had large holes that are easily fixed... and make me very competitive for top programs.
Help ! Any insight or advice will really help me out
Thanks in advance!!!

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[MI2005]

I have a similar situation to someone who posted yesterday... any help would be really appreciated, as I have to make a really hard decision.

I applied to 10 clinical programs and 1 Neuro/Cognitive and though my GREs and background is extremely strong, and I have research experience for 2+ years, my exp. is not directly related to the pop/type of research I want to do. That being said, I have 3 options...

1. Clinical program, excellent match research wise; middle range school (depending on the list you look at... prob 20-30 ish school), great match with advisor- personality and work-wise, very undesirable location

2. Neuroscience program- great research match, great location, funded, top 10 school, but isnt clinical ...they assured me that I can take assessment courses, but I will not be able to do any practica ...
I do not want to have a practice and want to remain in academia and do research, but the clinical PhD will allow me access to a population and a non-clinical will be somewhat limiting....
The Neuro program is in every other way a great fit, but will limit my options post-degree. I was really looking forward to the diagnosis aspects of a clinical program...

3. since I have obvious things I can do to enhance my apps for next year, I have several prospective research and clinical job opportunities...
Should I role the dice again (with significant additions to my applications.. i.e.authorship, independent project, work directly with clinical populations in my field, better Recommendations)
I am very ambivalent about turning down offers in order to risk everything and perhaps not get any the next go-round, but I feel very strongly (and was told by professors) that I had large holes that are easily fixed... and make me very competitive for top programs.
Help ! Any insight or advice will really help me out
Thanks in advance!!!

How would you feel about staying at your current job or finding another place to work?

 

[ClinApp]

Tough situation, hard to tell you what to do, just have a few thoughts to share. The biggest problem with reapplying is that you don't know which faculty will be taking students at the schools you are more interested in that your current clinical offer. It's really going to be a crapshoot, especially since it sounds like you got a really good match this time, I'd really hesitate to turn that down even though you are likely to be even more competitive next time around. However, if you really hate the place where the school is, I don't see why you'd want to make yourself miserable for 5-7 years.

As far as getting the clinical training, it's certainly hard to get it without going directly into a clinical program, so the neuroscience program doesn't seem to be a good fit in that regard. However, clinical training and practica (not to mention extra year for an internship) take A LOT of time and will take away from your available time for research, so if you really want to be a researcher/academic, it may not be worth it. However, I think the clinical training can be very valuable - but seriously consider whether it's worth the equivalent of an extra 2 years of training for you.

Good luck with this hard decision (but remember, you can't really make a serious mistake in this, as you'll almost definitely get into another good program or more next time, given your draw this time). The PhD is a very large commitment of time and effort, not to be entered into lightly.

 

[HonieButterfly]

This is def a tough one. All I can say is that applying next yr wouldnt be that bad. Obviously, your a strong candidate and with an extra year you will only be stronger, it can only get better next yr as my faculty advisor has told me. Seems your not 100% satisfied with the offers you've gotten and you def have some doubts and thats understandable since this is the next 5 yrs of your life. If you can handle taking a year off from school then I say go for it. Because as I said before next yr will only be better. I highly doubt it will get or be worst. Good Luck with your decision

 

[Dr.JT]

Are you interested in doing clinical research (i.e., research that appplies directly to clinical practice)? If not, the neuroscience program may be a better match, and you could always get a clinical respecialization in the future if your not happy.

 

[Psyclops]

I say, that unless the program is in some place that is an active war zone take the first offer. People put too much emphasis on location, in my opinion.

But I would ask yourself why you want to do clinical psych. Do you really want to be able to "diagnose" people? (Just going from what you said here) What will diagnosing people give you that is so important? The DSM is a piece of garbage anayway! So what if you give someone a label that everyone else agrees is worthless. Anyone with a BA in psych can do just as good a job diagnosing as a psychiatrist for the most part (not quite but the difference is negligable in most cases).

That said, you also mentioned that you wanted access to clinical populations. If the interest in clinical populations and issues is what drives you, then get the clinical degree, you mentioned the advisor is ideal. And don't pay much attention to ranking systems. Are we supposed to listen to US News about schools when they do such a terrible job reporting the news?

It's not an easy decision by any means, but I'm offering you some cynical thoughts to help you with your decision. Good luck! it souonds like you will do fine either way.

 

[lazure]

I'd say pick one of the programs and start school this fall. Grad school is for the long haul and better started sooner than later. If you're concerned about employment & research opportunities, go for the clinical program as you will graduate with the potential of more than one career. But I'm in clinical so I'm biased. If you have three good offers to choose from, why the heck would you walk away from them? And put yourself through that ridiculous application procedure again?

Also, I don't know the structure of the programs you're considering. If they have an independent Master's degree then you would have the opportunity to switch for your doctorate if the program did not prove to be a good fit. I did.

 

[HonieButterfly]

I dont think location is a big deal either but thats my own personal feelings. It depends on the person. Dont go somewhere in which your going to be unhappy and I think thats a good enough reason too. Some people dont like going to small towns or big cities or places with no diverse culture etc.

I say go to the neuro program but thats if I was faced with the decision

 

[marissaleigh77]

Thank you for all of the advice!!!

Besides the location, it is mainly a combination of being a lower ranked school in comparison to the other offer I have (non-clinical) and feeling as though I can do better if I reapply with more relevant research and better recommendations..

The rank trumps location, though the location still is playing a large factor... and i know that rank really doesnt (or shouldnt matter) .. I have several RA job offers that would make me a lot more competitive for top schools..

just not sure what to do because the non-clinical is ideal in almost every respect, but I wont be able to do clinically relevant research (which is my ultimate goal)
thanks

 

[perfektspace]

Who cares about rank? Your not talking about becoming a lawyer where the law is the law and Harvard does it better than Regent. A clinical psychology program has to be so tailored to your interests that an applicant may find that the top 25 or 50 programs are terrible matches and end up somewhere else. There isn't a great deal of difference aside from name recognition between number 5 and number 50. Take the clinical program. Like you said, it will open up a lot more doors and you can do, essentially, whatever research you like in the future. Good luck.

 

[lazure]

Honestly, there is no such thing as a perfect program and I suspect that come October when you're putting the applications together again you'll be kicking yourself. There's no way to assess at the outset whether a given program is a "perfect match".

 

[psypsypsy]

Honestly, the top school is the not the one that's ranked highest, but the one that best matches what you're interested in. More importantly, it's important that the faculty member you're working with is in a field you're interested in, and is well known in that field. You're going to have the easiest time finding jobs after graduation if you want to continue the line of research you've been doing in graduate school (not questions of focuses) and you have a mentor with connections.

Also...while doing more research will make you more competititive, it will only make you competitive in places you are a good match! There's no guarantee it will get you in "higher-ranked" schools. When I was applying, I remember getting interviews at a couple of the "better" schools, and not getting ones at a couple that were lower on the list. That's sort of the opposite issue, but the point is it was all about the match of my interests with the professors.

I think the emphasis on the rankings is a little too much. When I was interviewing, I found that a couple of the "top" schools had really mediocore clinical training, but that's not included in the rankings. Or they didn't have research I was interested in, so that made it not a top school for me.

So, if you think you could live at the location, I would probably say go for it. If you really think you'd be unhappy in that location...well, that's another story. Grad school is a long time to stick yourself somewhere horrible.

 

[psychanon]

It's silly to turn down an offer from a top 20-30ish school based on ranking. There is very little difference between top 10 and top 30 schools. When you get to schools ranked in the 50's and 60's, then you start to see a drop in quality. But someone at a school ranked 30 would be very competitive for academic jobs. Besides, rankings are extremely fallible indicators of quality. Have you ever looked at the methodology for these ranking systems? They're absurd:
(http://www.usnews.com/usnews/edu/grad/rankings/about/06method_brief.php):
"These rankings are based solely on the ratings of academic experts....
To gather the opinion data, we asked deans, program directors, and senior faculty to judge the academic quality of programs in their field on a scale of 1 ("marginal") to 5 ("outstanding")."

That's it! A single five point Likert-type scale, with no other indicators. I can't find it now, but I've seen the return rates on these surveys in the past-- they're something awful like 2%. The rankings are also very unreliable-- they vary a lot each time they publish them, and different systems have very divergent results. In contrast, rankings in undergrad, law, medicine, etc. use a broad index of criteria and are at least somewhat more consistent.

I think that most people who apply to clinical psych programs are lifelong overachievers who have trouble ignoring rank, but honestly, there are much more important factors at play. I would go the clinical program. So much of clinical admissions is based on chance, so if you apply again who knows if you'll get such a nice offer again.

 

[HonieButterfly]

Everyone keeps giving her the same advice. Obviously, she is not comfortable with settling and I dont think she should. Do whatever is make you most happy and satisfied. isnt that what counts? So what if she takes another yr.

 

[SaraL124]

But even if the RA position is one that would make you more competitive, don't you think you'd need more than 6 months (before apps are due again) there to really make an impression, have relevant work to show, and get good LORs? Personally, I think if you choose the RA position, you may be looking at 2 years before applications go out again.

 

[perfektspace]

But even if the RA position is one that would make you more competitive, don't you think you'd need more than 6 months (before apps are due again) there to really make an impression, have relevant work to show, and get good LORs? Personally, I think if you choose the RA position, you may be looking at 2 years before applications go out again.

Good point.

I think you would be a bit crazy to turn down the clinical offer you have and, as was mentioned before, there is no guarantee things will work out better next year or the year after. As crazy as the app. process is you are rolling the dice. Make the logical choice. You have already indicated that you prefer the clinical track as a stepping stone to your research interests.