How to proceed from here? Undergraduate.

[mikayla0]

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Background:

I'm currently a double major, public health and psychology.

My interest has moved from pure research towards wanting to provide therapy to low income populations. I think going for an MSW to eventually get a LCSW would be the best option for me. Then again, I feel that counseling psychology would be a good avenue because of my interest in research.

When I first attempted college I was naughty. This resulted in 6 F/FW's on my transcripts. I thought college wasn't for me so I joined the military. I served for 4 years and started taking classes again while serving. I've since taken classes since being out.

My GPA went from horrendous to a current cumulative of 3.43 GPA, 4.0 in psych courses, last 2 years I'm betting will be 4.0. I participate in public health research at my school. I have one publication and 2 poster presentations. Hoping for one more publication before I graduate in Fall 2017. I'm applying to a social psych lab to hopefully gain some psych research experience. My current research interests are in racial and gender bias and how it impacts health.

For community service, I was a USO volunteer for 9 months in the military but that was 4 years ago. Currently I volunteer as a Big Brother which has been an awesome experience. My Little is 16 so we have a lot to talk about. When I apply I would have been a Big Brother for 1.5 years.

My questions:

**Need help with this one!** I have more psychology classes left than public health classes. I have a lot to choose from, but I'm getting close to my credit limit. I have 4 more psych courses left. Are there ones I should I focus on more that would be more aligned towards what an MSW would want to see? What about if I wanted to pursue counseling psych? I've taken stats, research methods, social psych, abnormal psych, perception, history of psych, and human sexuality, so far all A's. I have room for 4 more psych courses, as a double major I'm near my credit cap. I see two developmental psych courses (infant-toddler or adolescent/adult, the adolescent/adult does not require I take the infant toddler), a physiological psych course, health psychology, introduction to psychotherapy, and many more. I want to pick classes that would be best suited for MSW and/or counseling psych.

Should I get more involved in my community? I will most likely have a whole summer for internship and/or volunteering next year. I would want to help out in a mental health clinic if I had a choice, but I'm not sure where I should reach out to. What about suicide prevention center?

Lastly, my public health professors have set me up nicely for my school's MPH program and public health was my passion before I learned about psychology or social work. While I know they are not exactly the same, they do have some major bridges. Would it be overkill to get an MPH after my MSW or if I wasn't accepted to an MSW program, to get my MPH beforehand? What if I applied to counseling psych programs and got rejected, but got an MPH instead of an MA in psych would that be shooting myself in the foot?

I know I'm at a part of the path where I will need to pick one but I'm not sure how to proceed.

Thank you!

 

[StellaB]

Counseling psychology (my field) and MSW are actually quite different, although there is some overlap in roles (primarily in providing therapy). In general, MSW programs are not as difficult to get into as PhD programs - from what you've said here about your experiences and stats, I think you would be a strong candidate for MSW - assuming of course you write a compelling essay about how you got in trouble with your grades, and then had a turning point / epiphany, etc.

The problem you are potentially going to run into with counseling psych is that many programs (especially funded) will not examine your application once they see the GPA, unless you can get it above 3.6 range. There are a couple of ways to deal with this. The first would be to get a master's degree first. Heck, you might realize after getting the master's that you don't need the doctorate to do what you want. It is not worth it to keep going to school if you are able to do what you want with a more efficient degree, because the lost income and potential loans you take out for those years will have a compounding effect over time in less retirement savings, less time spent building career, etc. Another option you have is to find researchers in counseling psych who are doing what you are interested in, and email them. Give them a BRIEF (seriously, so brief - then edit it again to make sure it's as quick a read as possible) snapshot of your interests and circumstances, and just ask if you sound like a competitive applicant. If they don't respond, they don't respond. If they say yes, they may now recognize your name when the application comes in and give it a look instead of just tossing it. If they say no, you just saved yourself the application fee.

If your interests really lie in research, I would strongly encourage you to examine social / applied health psychology programs. They will not train you at all for therapy work, but your interests seem right in that area. Additionally, a friend of mine who is a very recently graduated applied health psychologist had more job offers than she could even wrap her head around. There is a HUGE need and very few people specializing in this work. She is working a cushy position at the CDC now.

Hope some of this helps!

 

[smalltownpsych]

I don't think your app would get tossed from a funded PhD program because of the 3.4. Sounds like you have solid research experience and being published gives you a leg up. Find programs that match your interests and then ask yourself what do you want to be a social worker or a psychologist. What you want to do is less important to this question since either route you could end up doing similar things. We approach these similar tasks very differently though because of our different training experiences and perspectives. I tend to think being a psychologist rocks, but maybe I'm just a tad bit biased. 😉