If you are looking to be matriculated into one of the nation’s best graduate schools in psychology, then make sure that you add the University of Illinois-Urbana-Champaign to the top of your application stack.
Currently, Illinois holds the 7 ranking for top psychology graduate programs according to U.S. News and World Reports. At Urbana-Campaign, doctoral programs are offered in the following areas of research:
- Biological
- Brain and Cognition
- Clinical/Community Psychology
- Cognitive Psychology
- Developmental Psychology
- Quantitative Psychology
- Social-Personality Psychology
- Industrial-Organizational Psychology
- Visual Cognition and Human Performance
As an added plus, there are also interdisciplinary training programs in Psycholinguistics and Human Factors Psychology.
In order to be considered for acceptance to this school, a student must fill out the Institutional application as well as the Department of Psychology Information Form. Expect the Departmental form to repeat a lot of the same questions as the Institutional application, but it delves deeper into your educational background and future goals.
Admissions committees will use these responses to determine whether or not you are a good candidate for doctoral study. They must also have two letters of recommendation, graduate admissions essay, fully complete, sealed transcripts, and a GPA that puts you at the top of your class.
Like most other research-oriented Ph.D. programs, it will be a plus to have prior research experience to discuss within your personal statement. As with most other graduate programs, you can expect to submit almost all of your materials online.
While Urbana-Champaign offers a wide variety of areas of specialization, you can also expect that as a top graduate program, the competition may be fierce to get in. It pays off in the form of an acceptance letter to study hard for the GRE exam, identify potential faculty mentors, and write an effective statement of purpose.
Once all of these factors are in place, you can rest assured that your application package is among the top of the applicant pool.
Online Degrees Are Here to Stay
Online schools, colleges and universities are definitely here to stay. Accredited universities online are now offering various degrees ranging from certificate programs to Associates, Bachelor’s, Masters and Doctoral degrees. The choices are many, and distance learning degrees are now recognized by the US Department of Education as valid.
Accredited institutions award degrees to students who have successfully completed their online degree programs. Some online schools are also directly accredited with other established and traditional campus based universities making a degree earned in these programs as good as any other degree earned through the more traditional bricks and mortar schools.
Numerous students are choosing to earn their degrees via online study, with more choosing this option every year. No wonder then that more and more degrees are added every year to the listing of courses of study and available programs offered online. The recent proliferation in selection has been making online educational institutions a much more worthy choice than in years past.
Online schools are getting popular due to how busy our schedules have become and the need to work whatever job is available as the job market has tightened in recent years.
Just as online schools have become more popular recently, there are some popular degrees that are leading the pack as the most sought after by students. We have listed the most popular online degrees below in case you have not yet decided on what degree to pursue:
Top Ten Most Popular Online Degrees
- Business Management and Administration, this includes MBA programs and Marketing
- Nursing, both RN and LVN to RN
- Engineering includes all types of engineering from Civil, Mechanical, Electrical, Industrial etc
- Education, more specifically early childhood education and special education
- Computer Information and Technology including Computer Programmers, Database Management, Web Development and others
- Legal Degrees specifically Criminal Justice
- Psychology in all sub-specialties
- Human Services
- Health Administration
- Accounting- all sub-specialties
Business and accounting courses are still two of the most popular online degrees being sought by students, as this degree can open many opportunities to new graduates. Anyone with a business degree can find a position in almost all fields and industries making this degree very attractive as a course of study.
Nursing and Health Administration are also popular because of high earning potentials immediately upon graduation. With a nursing degree is very possible to obtain starting salaries of $42,000 annually. Additionally, hospitals are always in need of more nurses and health personnel.
With the widespread growth of technology and the Internet, it naturally follows that degrees relating to computer and information technology are also very popular. From computer programming to database management and web development, any degree based in any of the technological fields a sure winner.
Psychology and human services opens wide opportunities to graduates from working in human resources departments of companies to becoming a life coaches, taking advanced training as a social worker, or working for nonprofit organizations.