Pre-reqs and "old" classes

[irishrose]

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Hi, everyone, this is my first post. I graduated college in 2008, and I am about to begin taking classes and doing research to prepare to apply to a Clinical PhD program in a couple of years. I received a BA in English, but I took a variety of psych classes as an undergrad because I started out as a psych major. The classes were: Psy 101, Experimental design, Psy statistics, Abnormal, Neuroscience, Developmental, Social & personality development, and Adolescent development.

I am trying to choose a couple of classes for the fall and am having trouble deciding what to pick. I visited the websites for several top psy clinical programs, just to get an idea of what the suggested "pre-reqs" might be, and most of them simply said intro, stats, experimental as well as "upper-level psych classes."

1. Should I pick a couple upper-level psych classes, or is there an important class that I am missing from undergrad that you think I should take?

2. Also, I will probably need 2 years to gather enough research experience and good enough recommendations to apply to a clinical program. By this time, it will be 4-5 years after I have graduated college. I know that statistics and experimental design are two very important "pre-req" classes- should I retake them now since by the time I will be applying it will have been so long since I have taken them? This seems like a silly question, but I just worry about the amount of time that will have passed.

Thank you so much for your help!

 

[Ollie123]

Psy stats and experimental design at the undergrad level won't have changed much at most schools. Although both fields have advanced substantially, it isn't until you get to a higher level that you will really start to see substantial differences in coursework in such a short time period. At the undergrad level you are really just providing the foundation (i.e. the stuff that was established 30 years ago)...a normal distribution is still a normal distribution, a t-test is still a t-test, etc. In other words, don't worry about it.

Your established coursework seems to have the major points covered. I'd focus on getting some additional coursework in your area of interest, and maybe some more advanced courses in statistics and design depending on the route you want to go and how confident you are in your abilities there. Don't place too much emphasis on the coursework though. Assuming you have a decent GPA, some solid research experience will help you far more in applications than an extra handful of classes.