How did you decide where to apply?

[caitlinelise10]

Hi everyone. I am just wondering how you decided/are deciding where to apply to graduate school (what factors you are considering/considered, what is/was most important to you). Also, what information are you looking for when you research graduate programs and what questions do you usually have?

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[bcliff]

Research match, funding, location, APA match rate, mean years to completion, practica sites

 

[mcvcm92]

The most important factors that I am considering when applying to graduate programs are location, funding, speciality (school psychology) and average length of time to complete -- not in any particular order.

 

[bpsydme]

Hi everyone. I am just wondering how you decided/are deciding where to apply to graduate school (what factors you are considering/considered, what is/was most important to you). Also, what information are you looking for when you research graduate programs and what questions do you usually have?

In order of importance:

1) Research topic - are there PI's researching what I see myself studying for the next 4+ years? This also includes available practicas, how productive the PI has been in publishing, what population/methods he/she is using, and others.

2) Funding - is it a fully funded program? Partially funded, or not funded at all? With the exception of 1 school (Northwestern Feinberg), every program I applied to was fully funded.

3) Internship match rate - in the past 5 years, what is the average match rate, how many didn't match, are there reasons why?

4) Location - All the schools I applied to were in major cities and highly desirable locations like Chicago, Washington D.C., California. If I cannot see myself living in a certain city or fitting into a certain school (i.e. I dropped Brigham Young from my list) for the next half decade, I didn't apply.

5) General reputation of the school in both the department and overall.

6) This came after interviews: my general feeling of the program. Did I got a good vibe from current students, do I see myself interacting well with the PI, etc. Is the PI responsive, nice, dismissive, awkward, etc?

 

[Lisa44201]

1. Research interests
2. Location (my husband is a country boy, and would not do well in a large city; I do not want to live on either coast; limiting, sure, but I found several potential programs which fit those parameters)
3. Funding
4. (Back when I was looking at the possibility of a Clinical degree) APA match rates
5. Mention the phrase "non-trad"; gauge reaction.

 

[kpand]

I'm sure my method could have been better, but there's what I used:

1) Accreditation - Is the program APA-accredited? People give APA a lot of grief, but when it comes to getting one of the coveted internships, it's a hoop we'd like to jump through.

2) Location - Where will my spouse be willing to move? I don't think geography should have been quite this important so soon when I was narrowing things down, but I'm happy enough with the locations I selected.

3) Faculty - Is the PI doing research on a topic that I would like to commit to for 4-5 years? The programs are difficult enough, why not do research on something you're passionate about?

4) Funding - $$ fully funded guarantee? sign me up! This obviously led to the next criterion...

5) Dose of reality - Were my scores/GPA good enough to even get a consideration? If I'm below their median or mean, then I figured why spend the time and money?

6) Empowerment - After doing all this research, if I could not imagine myself going to the actual program/city or whatever, then I eliminated it.

 

[jrscientist]

In order,

APA accreditation

Research interest- topic, population, the professor that matches your interest is accepting students

Funding

Stats- #applied:acceptance rate, attrition, internship placement

Location- the importance depends on personal preference/needs.

 

[BOR84]

...the professor that matches your interest is accepting students

I second this.

My initial list was made up of fully funded phd programs (tuition remission and stipend), had professors doing the research I was interested in, apa accredited, good match rates, low attrition, reasonable time to completion, etc. The list became shorter once I contacted all the professors to inquire if they were accepting students the following year. The list got even shorter after I showed it to my advisor to get their opinion on it. I still ended up with a list of 16 programs, scattered all over the country.