study guides

This year's (2003) edition is so riddled with egregious omissions (such as the APA accreditations for many programs) that you'd be better off with last year's edition. Entire headings and subheadings are missing! Granted, some of the omissions are due to the schools themselves, but the APA should certainly know which programs they accredit. If you buy this book, you'll have to go to the APA website to get that information. This year, I cannot recommend it.

I bought this book in the hopes that it could give me some inside statistics on admission that the University websites could not. I was hugely disappointed. Not only are the stats completely non-descriptive, not all school descriptions list the same information (some are missing some info but it's the school's own fault for not submitting that info). As well, while the book does have Canadian Universities in it, 3/4 of the book is devoted to listing American schools (granted, they have a lot more), but if you are only interested in applying within Canada, it will be so much cheaper to just look at the websites for information.

The guide includes all of the typical intro.-to-grad.-programs information that one would expect of such a guide: (1) Providing a basic understanding of graduate degree programs, (2) what they're worth, (3) their entrance exams, (4) what to look for, (5) how to apply, and (6) other invaluable information.

Most importantly, the guide has (7) a comprehensive index of specific programs in specific areas of psychology so that a student may scan the kind of program they're interested in, find out about schools that have the program they're looking for, where it's at, how many full-time and part-time faculty are in the program, how many full-time and part-time students attend, how many male and female students attend, the degree requirements, entrance requirements, expenses, financial aid offered, faculty research interests, program contact, etc.

An indispensable guide for prospective graduate students in the field!