Psy.D. Webinar with admissions advisor Bradley Cypher

0:06Welcome to our PsyD webinar. I'm Bradley Slipher, the PsyD admissions advisor at Divine Mercy University. The format of today's webinar is straightforward. I will first move through a PowerPoint presentation where I highlight some of the most salient aspects of the PsyD program, and then we'll finish with some q and a. So if you have any questions at any time during the presentation, please place your questions in the chat box, and I will field your questions at the end of the presentation. Also note that I've listed, my email and my Calendly link as well as other resources in the chat box. So please send me an email or register for a time to meet with me on Calendly, and I look forward to speaking with you.

0:45Okay. So, yes, this is the overview of our doctoral program in psychology at Divine Mercy University. A bit about me, when I was younger, when I was in college, I wanted to be an attorney. So I was planning on going to law school after college, but, I became more interested in education as I went through my undergraduate years, and so I became a teacher. I taught, undergraduate excuse me. I taught, middle school, during my first few years after college. But I learned that I was, more interested in teaching at a higher level, and I was becoming more interested in my faith at the time. So I went to graduate school. I got a couple of master's degrees in theology, before getting a PhD in theology.

1:36When it came time to write my dissertation, I wanted to do something more practical. While many of my colleagues were writing, speculative primarily speculative dissertations, I wanted to focus in on a more practical topic. So I chose addiction as my the topic of my dissertation. And while I was researching, I bumped into Divine Mercy. I, they were really kinda doing a project that was very similar to my own. I was researching from a integrative perspective using psychology, theology, and philosophy. And that's exactly what Divine Mercy was doing. It's a program. All their programs are integrative in nature. And so I thought, well, you know, after I defend my dissertation, this would be a place where I would like to work.

2:19And so sure enough, that's what happened. I applied, you know, for this job, and and here I am. So my really my mission is getting people like you into their dream professions as clinical psychologists. So So a bit about the history of our school. We were founded in '99. At that time, we were called Institute of Psychological Sciences. And but we were growing quite quite a lot, thereafter. So by 2014, we had launched a master's in psychology program, which has had a focus on working professionals. And then in 2015, we renamed our school Divine Mercy University with the addition of our school counseling and our master of science in counseling. So, if you look at the school now, it's one university with two schools.

3:08We have the school of counseling, which has had, of course, the master's in counseling. It's an online and higher slash hybrid program. And then the Institute of Psychological Sciences, which houses the residential doctorates and the master of psychology, which is entirely an online program. So So our mission is healing and honoring those totality of the human person by integrating the best psychological science with Catholic anthropology in order to form mental health professionals of the highest caliber through rigorous academic clinical training. So, hopefully, this will be one of you or maybe all hopefully, all of you will be in our, marketing materials when you get your doctorate, of clinical psychology.

3:51We are located outside of Washington DC area in Northern Virginia, which is a wonderful resourceful and, as one that did graduate school in in much less ideal locations. This was this is a great place to work and live and study. We have a series of accreditations, which I think speaks to our commitment to high standards and academic and clinical rigor. We have received accreditation from the State Council of Higher Education, Virginia, the Association of State and Provisional Psychology Boards, the American Psychological Association, and the Southern the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools, and the National Council of State Authorization Reciprocity Agreements. So we basically have every relevance, accreditation.

4:40Now a bit about what distinguishes, you might ask, the psychology doctorate from the master of science in counseling. After all, don't they both prepare you to become clinicians? And, yes, that's true. You can be a clinician either at the master's or at the doctoral level. So these are a few things, though, that separates, a doctoral clinician from a master's one, at least in the level of training. So the first is that there's a strong emphasis in the doctoral program on psychological evaluation, psychological testing. Okay? So in the first couple of years, there's a series of four four courses. We call it sort of, like, the the four testing courses, you might say. So there you have one of them in each semester in the first two years, and you're going to learn all the major psychological tests, from personality assessment to cognitive assessments, that will really prepare you to expand your scope of practice, after you finish your doctorate.

5:39Also, you can see here that there's, there's many more hours that are required for the doctorate than there are, for the masters, which means that you're going to be abundantly well prepared to, be a clinician at the highest level after the doctorates 3,500, you know, the doctoral level versus the 700 of the master's. And then the final, big difference to my mind is the, dissertation requirement. So, doctoral candidates are required to write a dissertation, a full length dissertation. And these can be broadly distinguished between empirical dissertations and theoretical dissertations. Theoretical dissertations tend to use ideas that, they've gleaned from philosophy or theology and how these ideas are impact would impact clinical training.

6:28Right? Historically, given our, you you know, focus on, a school that's a Catholic school that's a focus on integration and philosophy, we've had a lot of students do, theoretical dissertations. But in recent years, given the strength of our faculty that's expanded to include faculty members with more empirical focus focuses. We've had many more students take empirical dissertations to the point where at this point, it's pretty well balanced. I would say that, we have about as many students writing empirical as theoretical dissertations. So it is a five year program, a 100 and twenty two credit hours that does include a master of psychology degree in passing on route to the doctorate. So you would receive a master of psychology degree at the end of the second year study.

7:21I want to show you the curriculum because it's quite, illustrative of what, you would be getting into here. So, the first thing you might notice about the curriculum is that it's like, the courses are front loaded. Okay? But what I mean by that is there's many more courses in the first couple of years than there are in the later years. So in some sense, it's sort of like medical school in that in that by analogy, as you move through the program, you become more clinically focused. But in the beginning, it's a lot of kind of meaty, science courses, philosophy courses, things like this. Okay. Now, from a clinical perspective, there's a really an, kind of like a sequence, you might say. The first semester of your first year, you're taking a course called basic, interviewing and clinical skills.

8:15And this course is it it's not, you're not seeing clients quite yet, but you are going to be role playing with your colleagues in in class. And so, you know, you might be the clinician, and you will be playing clinician clinician, and your colleague will be playing clients, and then you'll switch. That's very common. A big theme of this class is, empathy. Right? So, we place a strong emphasis on being able to understand the client in front of you. By this, we don't mean sympathy. We don't mean agreeing necessarily with, the clients. Rather, Suzie understands the person, you have to understand, like, the history, the the history of their ideologies, and how they got to the present moment. Okay?

9:02Now in the second year, you're going to start seeing clients. Okay? Probably between two and three clients. And then in the third year, you may triple the amount of clients you have, maybe to do between seven and nine clients. And that's intentional because we know that, in the second year, you're still in full time courses, and it's a lot of work. Right? So the client load is pretty light. But then you have relatively fewer courses in year three, and so you're going to have more, time seeing people. And then by the fifth year is your internship where there's no academic requirements at all. And there, you're simply, you know, seeing people, you're working with other psychologists, things like that.

9:46There's no there's no academics involved. Now from an academic side, there are a couple of major milestones. The first is you're, going to, propose your dissertation by the end of the second year and then take your comprehensive exams by the end of the third year and hopefully defend your dissertation by the end of the fifth. Now, is this for you? Is doctoral level training in psychology, your vocation? Here's a couple of questions that might help you discern. Do you want to help people flourish? Are you interested in the science behind human behavior? Do you want to become an instrument of healing through the psychological sciences? Are you interested in performing psychological tests and assessments to diagnose clients and create treatment plan?

10:35Are you looking to start a career as a licensed mental health professional, but specifically as a clinical psychologist? And do you have the ability and desire to work with all types of clients from more acute, from more acute care to more challenging and long term client cases? So one might ask, how does Divine Mercy, doctoral program compare to other PsyD programs? Well, we're similar to many others in the sense that we're APA accredited, and so we abide by a lot of the common standards that the APA sets forth. For example, foundations in psychological sciences, and research, integrity and practice, assessment and diagnosis, therapeutic intervention, and professional roles. Now we are distinct, though, in the sense that we're not just a Catholic school at least in name, and then we kinda have a secular kind of curriculum, but rather we're an integrative program.

11:28And so we, really place a strong emphasis on integrating what the church teaches about the human person, and and we put that in dialogue with the psychological sciences. The PsyD will open up a great deal of opportunity for you after graduation. These are a few of the settings in which you could, certainly work. A psychiatric hospital, is a great opportunity if you especially enjoy working in a medical setting, alongside, physicians, nurses, physical therapists, things like that. You, of course, would be the psychological experts with your focus on therapy and psychological evaluation. Military establishment. So things like, helping the different divisions of the military with, you know, evaluation, but also healing of people that have endured really serious PTSD.

12:19This is a big one because a lot of we have veterans that have gone through horrific, experiences in battle, and there's a great need for them to receive therapy. And the good news is that the military, recognizes an issue and is willing to divest a great deal of money, to get their people healed. Private practice is probably the most popular. And for many, it can be a wonderful thing. I would say, you know, if you enjoy the business elements of, psychology, if you can see yourself having your own practice, selling yourself, and marketing, this can be a great thing. But if you can't stand if you can't stand running a business and you don't wanna, put yourself out there and market yourself, this might not be the best thing.

13:02You might be a better fit elsewhere. Okay. Outpatient clinics or, for that matter, working in a clinical facility, things like working in an addiction rehabilitation center is a great way to serve a very, population that needs a lot of help, can be very rewarding kind of experience. And then diaspora consultation, you know, if you wanted to work, say, for a Catholic diocese, this is a this is a great one because DMU has a great reputation, among in the Catholic world as a school that really trains, people from a different perspective than many other secular, schools do. For example, a a classic case of this would be doing psychological evaluations for, seminarians. Right? Seminarians that applies to the seminary, will need to be screened for things like effective maturity, etcetera.

13:53And so only a psychologist can really do that. Here are assigned alumni speak to their experience with us. James Mollovich has said in our clinical psychology program, the training is focused on healing the whole person. Kristen Long, I was drawn to the program and desire to serve others more profound way in my previous positions offered. Timothy White, this school is not afraid to teach you what it means to be human at every level psychologically, philosophically, and theologically. That's why I like it. And Kirsten Curtis, I'm so thankful for DMU. The faculty members are very supportive, and I've received lots of hands on clinical experience. Okay. William Johnston is one of our current doctoral students who's done a lot of work in the area of PTSD and, helping combat veterans get, the healing that they need.

14:44So let's listen to his story. Hi. My name is William Johnston, and I'm a PsyD student at Divine Mercy University, currently approaching the end of my third year in the program. Military service runs in my family. And, and so both my grandparents served. My parents both served. This door, the PsyD program at Divine Mercy University opened the opportunity for me to continue to give back, to conduct research, and hopefully implement a more robust program to treat PTSD as it relates to combat veterans. DMU has certainly provided the integration that I saw in terms of my formation, both the philosophy and theology core, in addition to the psychology curriculum, has provided me growth in terms of my faith, and my role as a husband and father, and, of course, a psychological clinician.

15:51So in essence, the Catholic Christian meta model of the human person is is why I'm here, both for my own sake as well as the sake of my future clients. Okay. This is the story of a recently graduated as IDEA alumni. I would say that being a student at TY Mercy University or TMU is one of the best things that happens to me. I really appreciate a great support from faculty members and also classmates. I have gained a great deal of knowledge in all aspects of clinical practice, research, and also professional development. DMU not only provides students with strong academic skills, but also prepares them for a career in psychology. I personally benefit from mentorship with academic advisor and clinical supervisors.

16:57As a person, what I most appreciate from DMU is that its mission helped broaden my perspectives in understanding a human person through the lens of Catholicism. Catholic principle, especially in hope, love, and faith, are very valuable and certainly helped me become a better clinician. Okay. And I have one more video for you guys. This is Isaiah Lam. When he, recorded this video, he was in the second year of the program. He's currently in his fourth year. So let's hear his story. I'm originally from the the state of South Dakota, and so I grew up there most of my life, went to school at the University of Nebraska in Lincoln, was I studied psychology there, but I kind of intended to go into the medical field.

18:00And then after, kind of in the midst of my undergraduate, I, discerned that I wanted to go to the seminary, the Catholic seminary, and just study to be a priest. And so I had this love for psychology that was kind of there, I think, from an early age, just wanting to know how people function, why they do the things that they do. And then I found myself in seminary learning all these philosophical truths about humans. One of the first courses I took was, Philosophy of the Human Person, a person with body and soul, and that there's this profound dignity attached to being human. Later, discerned out of the seminary, returned to Nebraska to finish up my degree, and, deciding at this point, well, I don't really wanna go into, medicine, but I do, like, have this desire to care for people.

18:50And I also have learned, again, like, this philosophy about humans and and their goodness. So I took a year off. I built pipe organs for a year. I always love telling people that. It's a pretty unique job. It was fun. But ultimately, that led me, I decided to then do a year of service with the homeless in Denver with an organization called Christ in the City. And there I like to say that all the things I had been, learning about and dreaming about, psychology, philosophy, It was this incarnational experience of encountering people on the street in this profound suffering, mental anguish, I mean, substance abuse, what have you. And just actually experiencing that firsthand made everything kinda click for me.

19:38Like, okay, I have the ability to, affect change and bring hope to people in the worst moments of their life. And so for me at that point, it was just very clear everything was starting to converge, and I, felt more so that I wanted to pursue psychology, and so DMU was kind of my first choice because everything that I had been learning about kind of just, again, converged here, right? The psychology, the philosophy, the theology, and it just seemed like the perfect fit. So, I applied, and long story short, I got in and in my second year now, and it's been absolutely more than I could have hoped for. I've had so much knowledge shoved in my brain the last year. I, like, don't even know how it's possible, but it's just been a beautiful and awesome journey.

20:29Alright. I wanna say a word about our faculty. So, this is a generalist program in psychology. And by that, I mean, we don't have a hyper specialization in things like neuropsychology or forensic psychology. Rather, you're going to get exposed to all the different areas of psychology, which is reflective of the wide ranging, diverse centers of our faculty. So this is doctor Lisa Poloki. She's our dean. She's a specialist in assessment and therapy. Doctor Graves, is our, assistant program director. She's a specialist in child and developmental psychology. And Helena Orianna, doctor Orianna is our director of clinical training. Now these three men were among the founding faculty members of our school, dating back to the late nineties.

21:19And if you wouldn't mind, a quick story about these gentlemen, this guy, doctor Vitz, here on the right, actually was an atheist when he was a young man, and he converted to Catholicism in the seventies, after, getting a PhD in psychology from Stanford University, and then getting a host, his first academic position at New York University. But he didn't do that until he met and started dating a very lovely young French professor. Her name is Timmy, who at the time was just every bit, if not more, atheist than her her boyfriend, Paul. And when they got married, and then she got pregnant, what happened was this caused a really huge crisis of faith. Well, I mean, existential philosophical crisis for Paul because he thought, well, you know, what am I gonna tell my daughter about the meaning of life?

22:19You know? Am I just gonna say, well, you know, there's no heaven, hell, purgatory. There's no soul. There's no God. There's no intrinsic meaning to your life other than what you might assign to it. Anyway, so he wanted to sort of know what was real, and so he went on this big kind of quest for the meaning of life, and he read a bunch of philosophers and theologians. And, anyway and, anyway, he he kind of started to see that there are only really a few live options. He could kinda continue with the pageantry of academia and kinda make himself his own god, but he saw that to be kind of unfulfilling. The other option would have been to get into new age religion and Buddhism, but he saw that as intellectually unsubstantial.

23:02The third would have been to get into Marxism and Marxist politics, radical politics, sort of try to revamp the political, arena. But he saw that man was more than just matter and that politics was an adequate answer to the meaning of life. The fourth was to really just convert to Christianity, Catholicism in particular, which ironically, at least for him at the time, was the most unappealing and, you know, option. But that's what he went with because he saw that that's where reason was leading. Anyway, so he converted, but at the same time, this is, you know, this is in the seventies, and things are, you know, with the the whole cultural revolution, was in its heyday, and the humanistic psychology was also all the rage, especially led by, psychologists such as Carl Rogers.

23:52Vince, took issue though with a lot of these ideas because they were he found to be very kind of narcissistic. There's a strong focus on the self rather than God and other people. And so from a Christian perspective, this was somewhat problematic. Anyway, so he wrote a book about it, called Psychology as Religion, the Cult of Self Worship, which I highly recommend to all of you. It's a great kind of introduction to the to an important thinker, really a pioneer, of Divine Mercy University, doctor Paul Bitz. Anyway, when this was released, doctor William Nordling got a hold of it and read it and thought this was a brilliant work, but he we shouldn't just settle for publishing this book. We should start a school.

24:34And he said, well, you know, he got in touch with this. He said, well, why don't we start a school? It would be unlike any other. It would be continuing with the Catholic tradition of bringing faith and reason together. And it would be on the vanguard of this kind of new field, psychology, and it's never really been done. You know? Bringing philosophy and theology together with psychology, would be a new project. And so that's exactly what they did is they started to raise money, and they got faculty together. And before long, they founded DMU, in 1999. The rest, as they say, is history. Now, on a sort sort of more prosaic level, the doctoral program will prepare you to become licensed in anywhere throughout The United States, and elsewhere.

25:21The doctoral degree for licensure is, of course, required in The US, and there's about a nine to twelve month period of supervision after graduation while you're under a clinical psychologist. And then after that, you take your your exams at the national and the state level, and then you become, a full fledged psychologist in your own right. We have had a stellar, albeit imperfect, license rate of ninety five percent, from the past decade. So it's very good. And so is I think this bodes well for all of you, who are, hoping to be kind of fun with all psychologists. The other, good piece of news is that the demand for psychology is on the rise. The average, sort of growth for most app most occupations is about 3%, but in psychology, it's about 6%, so it's doing better than most.

26:12And the other thing I would say is that psychologists at the doctoral level are sort of a rare find. Right? There's many, many more people that have master's degrees than doctoral degrees. And so when you pair a great deal of demand for a relatively, limited supply of something, especially those that are doctoral level clinicians, they can do many more things than than the masters level be able to do. Then you're looking at making good money. I mean, I think the average salary for psychologists is somewhere in the nineties. So this is you can make it excellent money, as a psychologist. Okay. Investment. So it's a thousand $1.70 per credit for a 122 credits. Over five years is a $142.07 40. However, that does not include indirect expenses related to housing, gas, food, things like that.

27:04I would say most of our students don't pay that full amount, though. I mean, most will get between, anywhere from 15% off of that, sticker price and sometimes more in some cases depending on what what scholarships you get, how much you want to work, that kind of thing. There are, of course, there's, of course, federal aid available through the government. So submitting a FAFSA form is common for most of our applicants. Also, we offer, as I said earlier, work study. So we have work studies on campus available for our doctoral students. These are both on campus employments, things like, you know, working with me and my colleagues in admissions, but also, if they want to, certainly, working in, as a TA or an RA in their latter years of the program.

27:54These are a bunch of scholarships to which you would be eligible to apply to. They pay up to the amount here indicated on the right hand side. They attend to different demographics, so I would I strongly encourage you to look at our website, our financial aid page, divine mercy e d u slash financial aid, and it speaks to all of these in much more detail. A couple of note of specially, noteworthy, I would say is our, 50% off merit scholarship. That is, you know, the way that works is you don't apply that specifically. Rather, when you interview for the program, the faculty will rank all of the applicants in merit order and to allow the top, at merit scholarships to maybe the the first the top maybe three or four of them.

28:39The other one is, pretty easy to get is is the early admission scholarship. So if you apply early, you get $3,000 off of your first year's tuition. I mean, so if you, are swift on the application, you basically get free money. So there you go. Now requirements for admission, we do require back at least a baccalaureate degree from originally accredited school. We do prefer the UCLA psychology, but in no way is that necessary. We've received applicants from many, many different disciplines, everything from the hard sciences to the arts and humanities. Minimum g GPA of at least a three o and a four o scale. If you have a little bit less than that, if you have maybe, like, a 3789, get in touch with me.

29:25It might not necessarily be a deal breaker, but there are a couple of things that you need to be aware of. So please contact me, and I can help you with that. In terms of the procedure, the way this works is you apply first online. Okay? And then once that's received, the financial aid office will get in touch with you, and thereafter, we maintain communication until all the other elements, are taken in. Things like, the the the GP, the GRE, the transcripts, the the essays, things like this. Once everything is collated, the dean will review your, file, and then we will hopefully enter, invite you for an interview. We do have, three different interviews per admission cycle. This first one, though, November 8 is our most overwhelmingly it's our most popular one, for a couple of reasons.

30:18The biggest one is that we've tend to give out most we tend to give out most of our, top merit scholarships of the people that get into this interview, for the simple reason that it tends to attract the best students, the most conscientious students, the ones that wanna get in early and get it done. And as I said earlier, there's a $3,000 early admission scholarship for people that give everything in, before October 25. So, that's, you know, pretty easy to get. Now, the other things that will be required in addition to the online application, which can, which is on our website, is the following. Essays. We do require a couple of admissions essays about why you would want to become a, a clinical psychologist, why you want to study at the University of Mercy, and then also what areas of research are you interested in, or where do you want to focus your dissertation, things like that.

31:13The resume will need to be updated and sent in, and then recommendations will require three of them. Two need to be, actually, I take that back. This is not this is inaccurate. They don't need to be from professors, but they can be. So either professors or, work supervisors, one of the two will do just fine in either in any order. So you can have if you've, have been out of college for some time and you only have professional recommendations, that's fine. If you're college students or, recently minted college graduate, academic, recommendations will do just fine as well. Also, transcripts, do send those to us, from all post secondary schools. So if you have, regardless of whether you have a graduate degree or an undergraduate degree or both, you know, to send those to us.

32:02And then the GRE the GRE is required. However, it's not a super I wouldn't say it's the most consequential elements of the application. So it's better to get it done than to get it done try to get it done perfectly. So, I wouldn't say it's necessarily worth, sort of stopping life for the next couple of months to study. It's much better to just register for the for the exam and then take it into the best you can and send us the scores. Do send us the scores via this code, 5639, when you take the test. For international applicants that hold degrees from institutions outside The United States, these will need to be evaluated, to distill your transcript into an American GPA. So if you have a transcript that doesn't have, you know, a GPA on a four o scale, they will need to be evaluated by an evaluation service such as, west.org or educational perspectives.

33:05Either of those will do just fine for, the evaluation. Also, the app the applicants need to make sure that these that their degrees are equivalent to an American baccalaureate degree. And then if the credential isn't in English, it will need to be translated into that. And this, of course, is your responsibility. And then finally, if English is not your primary language, and by that, I mean, if you, don't do most of your personal and business affairs in English, we would say that English is not your primary language, in which case you would need to take the, the TOEFL or the IELTS academic tests. Okay? So if you have questions about that, please get in touch with me. I'd be happy to help you.

33:46Okay. Let's look at, some of the questions that people have asked. Let's see. Alright. Renina. Alright. Can you provide your email? Okay. That I that I put that in the chat box. That's that was the second thing, that I that I posted. It's bcipher@divinemercy.edu. Oops. Excuse me. Okay. Let's see. What else? Alright. Thomas from Donna. I'm a senior fire instructor at the Fire Academy and Training School of the Ghana National Fire Service. I'm really interested in applying to the Saudi program. I want to know if the program is fully funded. Okay. So, this is when I was speaking about the scholarships, what's isn't what I should have sort of maybe, explained is that this is not a PhD program. And by that, I mean, this is not a program that you would receive full funding.

34:48And usually what people mean by that is there's a tuition remission and, sort of like a living stipend. That's that's not the model that this that most American societies have. So, unfortunately, that's impossible. However, there are financial aid opportunities available. There are scholarships available. So, please take a look at that. If you have other questions, do let me know. Okay. What if I already have a master's in psychology? Can I skip the first, two years? I'm afraid that's not possible. If you have a master's in psychology, you would maximally get up to 18 credits transferred in, which would definitely make, different semesters depending on where those credits fell easier, and you wouldn't have to pay for those courses.

35:38But I'm afraid given the APA regulations, it's you can't just sort of, transfer in a master's degree and get the first two years, waived. Elizabeth, what is the full tuition price to offer scholarships or classes offer online? I'll take the first one the last one first. This is not an online program in any way. This is an entirely in person, brick and mortar, APA accredited doctoral program, so that's, not it's like, it's just not the model. I did speak about the scholarships and the tuition price, earlier. So, I just wanna really quickly, revisit that. Actually, I can't. I'm unable to do that. I'm sorry. But, Elizabeth, yes, we talked about that that if you do have questions about it, email me and get in touch with me, and I'd be happy to discuss that at a greater length.

36:36Okay. Everyone, thank you for joining me. It was a pleasure, to hold this for everybody. Again, if any have any questions, get in touch with me via Calendly or my email. And with that, take care, and God bless you.