USC MFT Program

[elliegee]

Hi! I would love to have some feedback from those of you familiar with the MFT programs in Southern California. Are any of you familiar with USC, Chapman, or SDSU? And which do you think is the better overall program. I am doing a lot of thinking about this on my own but would appreciate some input.

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[Yalomesque]

I cannot speak about Chapman or SDSU, but I can speak about my experience as an MFT student at USC.

My experience at USC was so-so. The only "permanent faculty" are Dr. Clark, Dr. Andres, and Dr. Chung. The rest of the courses are taught by adjunct instructors who are relegated a small depressing room for "office hours." There will be a lot of emphasis on the fact that USC is a "research one" institution but that honorific has nothing to do with the MFT program. You will not do any type of research at all as an MFT student at USC. I don't know if they even offer thesis anymore, but they actively discouraged the entire cohort from doing a thesis and instead had everyone take a "how to be consumers of research class" in lieu of a thesis. They do not have the resources to have their students do a this. If you do research it'll be because of your own initiative in another dept of the school (good luck with that).

The MFT program is housed in the Education dept, (ie Rossier) and the other programs get a lot more attention. Some of the administrators at Rossier will not even know about the existence of the MFT program.

I've listed many of the negatives...but in short, USC's MFT program is just a so-so program that uses the name of USC at large to paint itself as an elite program. Yes, being an MFT student at USC means that you've joined the "Trojan family." But I would urge anyone considering attending the program to think about what that means. In the years following my attendance at USC I can tell you that the name USC has only helped me ever slightly in conversation. The USC MFT program itself only has a Facebook page for the occasional posting regarding job opportunity. It's not exactly the well-connected networking machine that only the elite enjoy. Hope this helps you.

 

[wigflip]

Isn't USC up to $40,000/year now? That's a lot of money to pay to be taught by adjuncts (presumably low paid, no-benefits workers). Sounds like that's why the thesis is phased out. No one to advise students on their research.

Other SoCal programs of possible interest:

CSU Fullerton
CSU Northridge
Pepperdine
Antioch

I'm pretty sure that all of these are going to be cheaper than USC.

 

[sportpsychcop]

Pepperdine is out of site cost wise, I checked it out....was all excited until I found out there was no help with financial aid or tuition assistance of any kind...I wish it was affordable, its close to my house, seemed to have good profs, and really nice facilities.

Im at Fullerton right now for their sports psych program, great profs (Ravizza put the place on the map, Traci Statler, Lenny Weirsma, and Andrea Becker are legit and really cool too), but I will tell you this, the place is the ghetto to me. Horrible campus, mediocore students, not a nice location, etc. Maybe I am spoiled, I went to really nice undergrad schools and have another masters from a top notch program in its respected area (forensic science), and I have coached at an Ivy League school and a Patriot League school...so CS Fullerton to me is like an armpit to me...just a really big commuter school.

I was thinking about a PhD in sport psych, but also am considering masters in counseling either here in SoCal or elsewhere (I have no ties here but I do love living on the beach in LA)...

Im interested in getting some real applied knowledge, or is that just not possible in a masters? This is my second masters degree, and I feel like each one of them despite being the top in their area of interest, has not really prepared me to go out and do work in the area I want...more like its going to give me a piece of paper that might open some doors, and it will be OTJ training and lots of reading, seminars, and learning from experiences on my own.