I attended Kennesaw State University for my bachelor's degree. It's a school that is growing quickly and is located just north of Atlanta. One of the required classes for a psychology major is "Careers in Psychology" which is essentially an overview of what you can do with the degree. As you may recall, I mentioned that I had decided to go to graduate school long, long ago as a child. This course did nothing but drive that point home. The overall message? If you don't plan to go to graduate school... don't be a psychology major. This structure was fine with me at the time. But as I look back it frustrates me how limiting this could be to people who were on the fence or were not planning on going to graduate school.
Not only were we taught that you had to go to graduate school to do anything in psychology but also the exact steps that we should (and, more accurately, should already have) take(n). First and foremost, if you are not ALREADY working with a professor on his/her research... you will fail. Now this dramatic statement was a trademark of the professor I took the course with but was not universal in the department. But I digress... I left the course completely freaked out and almost changed my major.
It wasn't for another year and a half that I actually began taking the "necessary" steps to extracurriculars that would be absolutely essential in the "getting into grad school" part of it. I do not mean to sound like I don't think these things are important. Quite the opposite really. As a once skeptic, I am now 100% on the bandwagon of the "get involved! get involved!" folks. I LOVED every second of everything I got myself involved in. My extracurriculars are the crowning jewel of my education. They are not just place holders on my curriculum vita but they actually shaped me into a much more confident and capable person. They actually MADE me happy. Oh... and not to torture the point... they made me love the college experience and want to help others love it too.
Here is a little overview of some of the things I did. I participated in five directed studies. I presented three projects at the Southeastern Psychological Association's annual conference (and attended this conference twice). I presented two projects at the Association for Psychological Science's annual conference. I spent a semester in a research practicum with the Atlanta Executive Network. I participated in the semester-long Women's Leadership Experience. I worked with one other student to found a branch of the American Association of University Women at KSU. I spent one year as the president of that organization. I also spent a year and a half on the executive board of the Psychology Club serving as both reporter and treasurer. I attended the National Conference for College Women Student Leaders in Washington DC. I volunteered at Devereux, a local residential psychiatric treatment facility....
Through all of these experiences I developed very close relationships with two of my professors. Now that I have graduated, I can truly say that I consider them friends. They helped me so much and in so many ways. While all of these extracurriculars look fantastic to admissions committees for graduate schools, I think that the amount of growth that a person experiences when participating in these kinds of things is what is truly important.
I think it's great that the KSU Psychology Department does such a fantastic job preparing it's students for graduate school. However, I think that it may be taken too far in some cases. From my personal experience, I felt that there was a strict list of "rights and wrongs" when it came to what I should be doing. I was so stuck on a path that I both created for myself and was pushed into that I didn't allow myself the opportunity to step back and really "feel". It's very difficult to explain. The only thing that could have ever changed my mind about going to grad school was going, hating it, and realizing that everything will be ok in the end.
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