Questions!

[scienceisbeauty]

For anyone who is already practicing or has gotten into Clinical Psych grad school:
What do you think my chances of getting in are? My desire is to work with children with autism, and even more if I get the chance, deaf children who have autism
- my grades this year: 95,91,86,86,82,81,80,80,74 (GPA this yr = 3.73)
- I am going to be submitting a journal article to Pediatrics or Pediatrics Review (I'm in the processes of doing so)
- I have been volunteering as a telephone reassurance counsellor for 2.5 years
- I have volunteered with children with autism for 1.5 years, and will be starting again
- I have taken some sign language courses and will take more starting in September
- I currently am on the Dean's List and have been for the past 3 years
- I work for 3 professors (not relevant to the field of autism...but..)
a) one of them is extremely famous and well known
b) I have a SSHRC grant with another one of them -
c) and one of them is just meh, i get paid for working from HOME

Sooooooooo..........anyone, someone, suggestions for increasing my odds? What are my odds? Any help would be SO appreciated! THANKS!

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[RayneeDeigh]

If that work for profs involves research, I'd say you have an excellent chance. I had way less experience than you and got in. Granted some of it's luck, but I think you'll be fine. My money would be on you!

Are you applying in Canada? Schools love the SSHRC thing, congrats on getting it.

 

[Ollie123]

Provided you do well on GREs/Subject GREs (think that is the only missing piece) you are in a good position to get an interview. Hard to say what your chances of acceptance are since we don't see your interview skills here, but that is really what dictates acceptance. Stats get you in for the interview, but I'd hazard a guess the interview ends up being the deciding factor once its narrowed down to 2-3 candidates.

Keep that research up, congrats on the SSHRC, and nail your GREs when the time comes. You'll be in quite good shape as long as you interview well.

 

[Psychbar]

Your qualifications are definitely good enough to get you into several of the better PhD programs. If, however, you are applying to the most competitive PhD programs in the country (like Penn for example) there is no gaurantee that you'll be accepted. even the best are not accepted to every school they applied to. like the others said, if you do well on GREs you should be in a pretty good position.

 

[JockNerd]

I think your chances are awesome, provided you don't make the mistake of not checking out profs and going for a good fit! Although, your stats are SUPER impressive and it looks like any program would be lucky to have you.

About your original post--what sort of career are you going for? Do you want to be solely a practitioner, working with kids with autism? Do you want to do research and teach as well, or not?

 

[scienceisbeauty]

WOW, thanks guys for responding so quickly. For sure appreciated! I have looked at several professors, there's one I really covet. He works with deaf children who are on the autism spectrum. I'm terrified of him though because I want to work with him SO much. There are also other professors that I'd like to work with, I of course wouldn't want to spend 5 years, even if it is in Clinical Psych doing something I hated. Would be terrible eh? <-- so Candian
So I have done a bit of research.
Now, my stats marks are on the rather icky side, I have an 82 and a 70 in stats I and stats II respectively. Do you think they'll be really put off by that or would my other "good things" take priority?
Do you suggest, before applying, to go and take a FULL YEAR in sign language? And then apply to the professor? The reason I'm hesitant to take a year after graduating (I'll be graduating nxt year) is because I'm afraid I won't be able to get awesome enoguh letters (the profs will forget me)...I know, it's probably the dumbest thing you've ever heard, but you know, applying while I'm still "fresh in their mind"...I don't know. What do you think?
Anyway.... I SINCERELY APPRECIATE YOUR RESPONSES ALL OF YOU! SO HELPFUL
I want to be a practicing clinician but I also want to do research and advance the field (I always thought the two went hand in hand)..

 

[RayneeDeigh]

To be honest, I didn't even take Stats I and II, I just had two courses in research methods with a heavy stats emphasis. My completely uneducated guess is that my high math score on the GRE made them less worried about my stats capabilities. So... aim for high GRE scores and my thinking is that your stats marks (which really aren't THAT bad) will be a relative non-issue.