I am a current community college student who will be transferring soon and majoring in Psychology. I would like to right after graduation earn my Master’s Of Science In Education In Counseling. The program i’ve been looking at does not require the GRE and only requires letters of recommendation and transcripts as well as a personal statement. I would like to become a therapist so I was planning on applying to that program and a Master’s Of Social Work program which also doesn’t require the GRE. Is two graduate programs enough? Is it too early in my college career to be worrying about applying to grad school?
It’s not too early to think about the end goal. Check out some state licensing requirements to see what type of degree requirements and supervision are needed to be licence as a therapist, then you can figure out what type of graduate degree will best help you get there. Then you can figure out what undergraduate prerequisites you need to gain admission to the graduate program. You don’t need both types of masters degrees you listed, but most school counselors aren’t therapists. Many with masters in social work become licence clinical social workers and can provide therapy. To maximize your chance after admission to either type of program, do your very best in undergraduate school. Especially if GREs aren’t required, high grades in prerequisites will be.
First of all don’t get hyperfocused on one program. You should apply to a range of programs, and some of them might require the GRE. You don’t have to worry too much about the GRE right now - that’s more for end of junior year or the summer between junior and senior year - but don’t select programs on the basis of whether or not they require the GRE. You don’t want a four-hour test to determine the trajectory of your career.
Whether or not two is enough kind of depends on how competitive you are as a student. I would say most people apply to more than that - probably somewhere between 4 and 7 master’s programs.