Psychology Graduate School Preparation
- Before You Apply: How To Be a Competitive Candidate
- Contact an Adviser
- Explore Graduate School Options in Advising Tracks
- Letters of Recommendation
- Timeline for Graduate School Preparation
- Resources
- Writing Your Personal Statement
See Graduate School Application Resources compiled by Emily Bibby.
About Graduate School in Psychology
Graduate School Advising is available for Psychology majors and minors and for Pre-Physical Therapy majors through the Psychology Advising and Resource Center (PARC). The purpose of Graduate School Advising is to help students with all aspects of the graduate school process (not just specific to psychology graduate school), including:
- Deciding on appropriate pathways/training opportunities to prepare for future study of psychology
- Deciding on whether or not they want to attend graduate school
- Deciding upon areas of study for graduate school
- Utilizing search programs/materials to locate appropriate graduate study programs
- Identifying locations and preparatory strategies for completing prerequisite exams (i.e., GRE, Psychology GRE)
- Preparing materials for graduate school applications (i.e., curriculum vitae, personal statements)
- Editing application materials
- Soliciting letters of recommendation
- Navigating the interview process
- Choosing the appropriate program
Selecting Schools and Labs
- PCSAS Accredited Programs: List of exceptionally high quality Clinical PhD programs
- Insider's Guide to Graduate Programs in Clinical and Counseling Psychology (book): New edition released every year
- ABCT Special Interest Groups: This can be especially helpful for Clinical PhD applicants. If there is a special interest group (SIG) for your subfield of interest there are lists of professors in those groups and newsletters about what the labs are actively doing!
- List of Professors/Labs Accepting for Ph.D., Psy.D., or Master's
Personal Statement Writing
- Advice for Addressing COVID in your Personal Statement
- Individualized Feedback on Personal Statements
- APA
- Rutger’s Writing a Personal Statement Tips
Diversity Statement Writing
To speak with an adviser about any of the above or anything else related to graduate school, please visit the Psychology Advising & Resources Center.
To explore specific graduate school and career paths, please see the Advising Tracks.
Additional Resources
Explore the following links to several important sites associated with graduate school, along with several important documents related to graduate school prepared by the Psychology Advising and Recourses Center.
Websites
- Graduate Study Online from the American Psychological Association (APA): This is the most comprehensive website regarding graduate study in psychology and can be used for up to 3-months for $30. It is essentially an electronic version of the APA Graduate Study in Psychology book. The Advising Office has a subscription to this online search engine, which students who visit the PARC are welcome to use with an adviser.
- The Council for Accreditation of Counseling and Related Educational Programs: For students interested in the counseling route, as opposed to the clinical psychology route, the Council for Accreditation of Counseling and Related Educational Programs puts out a list of all of the accredited Counseling masters programs in the nation.
- GradSchools.com: This is a free online search engine for graduate programs in psychology.
- Graduate Record Exam: Most graduate programs in psychology and related areas require the Graduate Record Exam (GRE). The ETS website has information about the test and to register.
- The Social Personality Health Network (SPHN) is interested in connecting students applying to graduate school in social/personality and health psychology with potential graduate advisers. To do so, they have developed a simple online form where faculty can post that they are seeking students, and students can search through a list of potential advisers. If you are considering applying for graduate school in social/personality or health psychology, you can browse a list of faculty within these disciplines who are accepting graduate students this year.
- OnlinePsychologyDegrees.com: This resource includes 10000+ psychology degree programs (from counseling certificates to advanced degree specialties) from over 1600 accredited universities in the U.S. and volumes of expert advice from others already working in the field.
Additional information about graduate school is frequently produced by the following organizations:
Books
- Getting In: This is a great book that provides readers with tips on all aspects of the graduate school application process in psychology.
- Graduate Study in Psychology: This is the book equivalent of the Graduate Study Online search through APA.
Information Prepared by the Psychology Advising and Resources Center
- Before You Apply: How to be a Competitive Applicant: an overview of how to begin early in your undergraduate career to be a competitive applicant for graduate school.
- Timeline for Applying to Graduate School: a general overview of how students can prepare for graduate school in psychology, beginning as early as freshman year.
- Curriculum Vitae (CV): [PDF] provides students an example of a CV.
- Statement of Purpose: provides tips for writing an effective statement of purpose.
- Recommendation Letters: provides an overview of and tips for securing letter writers.
There are many more documents available related to graduate school and the application process available in the PARC. Please stop by today for more information!
Graduate School Application Resources
Created by Emily Bibby while applying to Clinical Ph.D. programs. For questions or other resources to add please email emilysbibby@gmail.com.
General Resources
- A Field Guide to Grad School (book)
- The Sokol-Hessner Lab’s How Applying to Graduate School Works
- Clinical Psych Grad School
- Student Doctor Network: Essay workshop, cost calculator, relevant blog posts
- American Psychological Association: Preparing and Applying for Graduate School in Psychology: 12 Modules
Mentorship through graduate school application process
- Free Online Mentorship
- Association for Psychological Science (must be student affiliate member)
GREs
- GregMAT
- Best resource for the verbal section
- VictorPrep Podcast
- Podcast for learning vocabulary
- U.S. and Canada Psychology Ph.D./Psy.D. Programs Not Requiring the GREs
- Kaplan resources
- ETS resources
- Manhattan Review
Personal Statement Writing
- Advice for Addressing COVID in your Personal Statement
- Individualized Feedback on Personal Statements
- APA
Diversity Statement Writing
Interview
- Lists of Interview Questions to Ask and Prepare For
- How to Answer Specific Common Interview Questions
- Interview Information
- Interview Tips
- https://www.psychologyinaction.org/psychology-in-action-1/2014/01/13/interview-tips-for-students-applying-to-phd-programs-in-psychology
- https://psychology.ucsd.edu/undergraduate-program/undergraduate-resources/graduate-career-resources/applying-grad-school/interviews.html
- https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/grad-school-guru/201105/interviewing-part-2-doing-the-talking