<p>I realized I accidentally posted my first thread in the “Pre-College Issues” forum, so I figured it’s more relevant here.</p>
<p>Is anyone familiar with this particular program? I’m a junior and I’m immensely interested in getting some research experience as an undergrad. Here’s a quick summary of the past three years in college: I transferred to USC from Penn State with an undergrad GPA of 3.74, comprised of classes such as Econ, Sociology, Statistics, Spanish, Writing, etc. I transferred to USC, hoping to major in Film, but I’ve become very opposed to the idea of working in Entertainment after interning at a studio. I’ve recently switched into Psychology after I discovered my passion for it. I’m also considering minoring in Sociology. Right now, my GPA here is a 3.53. My first year here was just mostly film classes and a course to fulfill my GE requirements. I actually dropped one of my TV theory classes because there was no purpose for me to take the course last semester, so I have ONE “W” on my transcript.</p>
<p>I guess the reason I’m explaining my grades is because I’m anxious that the “W” might be held against me for research programs (even though the course is irrelevant to my major). The Undergraduate Summer Research Early Identification Program allows students to apply up to three institutions with one application. If accepted, a student is provided with a stipend of $4,000 and all expenses will be taken care of as I research and present at a conference (and get published) over a course of 8-10 weeks. The schools that carry my interest in Social Psychology research AND I’m eligible to apply for are: Stanford, Princeton and Yale. Yup. Pretty much all crapshots. Due to the level of competition, I’m also applying for other summer research programs offered at USC, such as McNairs and SOAR/SURF.</p>
<p>Does anyone have experience with this particular program? Any tips and advice? Since I want to focus on Social Psych, I’m thinking about getting recommendations from both a Soc and Psych professor. I’m very ambitious about pursuing my PhD in Social Psychology and I’m trying my best to make the most out of my undergrad to get into the best program later down the road. Should I even worry about the one “W?” Am I being too pessimistic about the application process? I just need some reassurance…thanks!</p>
<p>I don’t know why you decided a W was better than sticking out a class. Don’t do that next time, you can’t afford more than one, but I wouldn’t worry about this one.</p>
<p>The main thing I see as an issue is the lack of demonstrated interest in pursuing a PhD, as you only have recently declared the major and have no previous research. Not to discourage you from applying, you should apply to this and as many other opportunities that you can find. Getting a chance to do research will help you find out if that is what you want to do and help you build a good application.</p>
<p>Have you looked into REUs? (Research Experiences for Undergraduates) They’re often tough to get into, and you’d probably have to apply to a ton of them, but that would be another way to get great research experience over the summer.</p>
<p>You’ll be fine with one W in an unrelated course. I had two and I am in a top 15 psychology program.</p>
<p>You need to apply to a bunch of summer research programs. For the summer between my junior and senior year, I applied to at least 7 and I only got into 1, and I had already been doing research for 1.5 years by then. They are VERY competitive. You can Google search “summer undergraduate research psychology” and find some - there are literally hundreds.</p>
<p>Although it would be nice to do research in exactly your interest area, keep an open mind. At this stage your goal is simply to get ANY experience within psychology. (Those schools would be great though, as they all have awesomesauce social psychology departments. I love my grad program, but if I were applying all over again Stanford and Princeton would be near the top of my lists. Social psychology is my field, too.) So anything that’s remotely in the range of interest to you, apply for!</p>
<p>What I do want to prepare you for is the eventuality that you may not get into these top psychology programs straight out of undergrad. It is becoming increasingly common - especially in very competitive subfields like social and clinical - for students to get 2-3 years of full-time research experience post-college as a lab manager or research coordinator before going on to do a PhD. Especially if you are a junior and you just now switched to psychology - and presumably don’t have any psychology research experience.</p>
<p>Don’t despair; this is a good thing. 2-3 years will help you further solidify your desire to go and your particular research area; you can get some presentations and maybe even a publication; and more importantly, you’ll get more experience in all aspects of the research process, which will make you more confident when you start the program (and may even make you get through faster, as you won’t start blowing in the wind after you complete your coursework like I did, lol!) University psychology labs in traditional departments are an obvious place to look for these jobs, but also medical schools (in psychiatry departments - but other departments do behavioral research, too), schools of public health, and schools of education.</p>
<p>one withdrawal won’t likely even be noticed.</p>
<p>What will hinder your app, however, it lack of Psych courses (since you just switched into the major), and a track record which demonstrates commitment. (Academics love to think that their program is #1.) Not saying that you can’t/won’t be successful, but the fact is that you will be competing with hundreds/thousands? of current Psych majors, many of which are premed (with relevant coursework: Calc, Lin Alg, Stats, Comp Sci, etc.), and perhaps on-campus research backgrounds. I have no doubt that this is particularly true at 'SC, which has a lot of premeds, and a lot of gunners. Thus, your odds are really low.</p>
<p>Definitely apply to SURFs/REU’s, in non-popular locales, such as the midwest. My D had the coursework, numbers and recs, and received several acceptances to carefully-selected summer research programs. (She ignored Amgen, for example.)</p>