1. Today is my last day as an AP! I've had a lot of self-doubts over the last three years, and my leaving has prompted a lot of lovely comments from my colleagues, so I'm really leaving on a high. 2. Looking forward to my six weeks off before the doctorate starts. Several holidays planned but findin...

Something that strikes me from reading this is just how individual the emotional experience of pursuing clinical psychology actually is; our satisfaction with our journeys is biased by all sorts of internal and external factors. To illustrate, my university friends completed degrees in highly desira...

Just to clarify, because I think I accidentally removed this sentence from my post, I am fine with being told I'm not clinically qualified as a psychologist. That's just an undeniable fact and there was no way that I should have been given the same level of responsibility as a CP. I'm also fine with...

I appreciate the view, Spatch. Your perspective has softened my opinion of the term, thank you. To answer your question, I suppose I would probably just say "non clinically qualified", which is a subtle difference but clarifies that it's referring specific to the professional practice as a psycholog...

I have always found the term "non-qualified" to be quite jarring as a way of referring to people in roles that are pre-doctoral level, namely assistant psychologists and trainees. "We need at least two 'qualifieds' to run the group; 'non-qualifieds' don't count!" "Yes but he's a 'non-qualified', any...

Not sure from a time-commitment front, but I'm fairly sure a lot of DClin courses forbid any additional income via private practice (I presume revenue from investments and share dividends are fine). It may be best to check with the course whether or not this is even allowed.

Your experience and credentials are good. People get onto the doctorate with less experience than you. I'm not sure entirely what proportion are never successful on the doctorate, but what we do know is that generally those who get on are able to do so in fewer than four to five attempts. That means...

At interview, they will only require a driving license as evidence of this criterion. In light of this, I think it's fine to wait until you are offered a place before shelling out a lot of money on a car and insurance. Who's going to know? Also, remember placements usually don't start until November...

I have not historically had very pleasant experiences with the GMA tests, because: 1. An application to a course, and thus a quarter of your chances, can be written off entirely within a thirty minute snapshot of performance (I suppose you could argue the same for an inteview). 2. Errors compound in...

Hi Pink Freud, thank you for your thoughtful comments, knowing how stretched the interviewers are and that often feedback is brief gives me a much more realistic picture. For some reason all the people I had spoken to about the interview process had gotten telephone feedback, so I thought I hadn't ...

Was the course very science based? What are you doing now ? I'd say it was more clinically focused actually. There were a total of four modules, if I remember correctly. One was focused on the academic-based aspects of neuropsychology i.e. the neuroanatomy and imaging techniques. The second was abo...

I am going to go out on a limb here and say that both perspectives hold merit. I think it's important to acknowledge how frustrating it is for someone who has battled with all the anxieties and uncertainties associated with applying to the doctorate to get close to reaching that coveted goal but be ...

Hello, I have just graduated with a bsc psychology degree and got a 2:1. I am going to be doing Masters from September. In the future i would like to apply for a Clinical psychology doctorate programme. I am stuck between two MSc programmes: an applied Clinical Psychology msc at the University of B...

Thank you Workingmama. That is a very useful alternative way of thinking about contentious issues that hadn’t occurred to me previously (despite now seeming really quite obvious 🤔). I will think more on this but I can see that considering it like this may help to prevent that “I’m banging my head o...

Hi all, thank you for your very lucid interpretations of this issue. It is very validating to hear that you feel I was right to be annoyed. Lingua, I am awfully sorry to hear about what happened; that sounds like an incredibly, as you say, violating experience and I imagine it was difficult not to t...