Yeah, I had graduate assistantships during my Master's which were explained the same way as "stipends"... they nowhere near cut the cost of living. I'm in a lot of debt. Not a crippling amount, especially for my level of education, but... a lot.
I don't have interest in teaching (at least not full-time) and have a lot of disillusionment around research, and around academia in general. A Ph.D. wouldn't really add much to the range of things I'm able to do AND actually WANT to do.... other than make more money. (Seeing how much my insurance company would dish out for 10 billed hours of neuropsych testing was the best advertisement I've yet seen for getting a Ph.D., lol.) But if I reach the point where if I'm doing more education to make more money, I'd rather try for something like tech than keep doing this same career track.
I thought you had a PhD You certainly carry yourself as well as one. PhDs are expensive unless you are a minority group member - they don't count women as minority anymore since the field is filled with them.
I'm unmarketable because the PhD is kind of worthless without a license and you have to get people to supervise you for it. I've failed at that at least twice due to my lack of social skills. Teaching is a lot easier since it's online and I offend less that way.
My cousin got her MSW first and then the PhD in psychology - she is some kind of director of a homeless mental health place in Boston. She did it that way because the income from the MSW allowed her to afford the PhD program.
TY for that- and I was mostly giving you shit; not really offended. Even if your attitude was snobbily in favor of "more education means you're a better, smarter person," that's not something I agree with and not a standard I therefore feel the need to hold myself to, if that makes sense. I hit an economic barrier that may have held me back from my "true academic potential," but I still got my Master's, and that's more than a lot of people are able to do. I'm blessed I was able to get as far as I did.
I've been in situations where I realized I had a better grasp of clients and what to do with them than their psychiatrists or the physiologists who tested them. Education in this field really doesn't apply very well to practice IMO; experience matters more. And neither can compensate for an outright lack of common sense (or just plain being an asshole, which is also a problem I've seen people with higher education and higher pay than me have problems with).
Dang. The shit went right over my head. Dang aspergers.
I am of the opinion that to get a PhD all that's needed in terms of intelligence is a high school diploma. The PhD means nothing in terms of intelligence. The best education I got in psychology was working at the crisis service in Springfield. There's not really any way that I could prove I'm not an education snob. But that was the point I was making about the doctor. He failed his residency yet was trying to convince me that having the terminal certificate meant something.
The same sort of thing happened to me at the crisis service - we had something we called "doctoring" them. If someone was being snobbish or downright stupid, they would put me on the phone and I would say "This is doctor ..." It was a lot of fun. The insurance companies look for the doctor too, which to me was weird given that many of the other folks I worked with had far more experience than me.
The psychologists were the worst - entitled and stupid. They didn't expect to encounter another psychologist because all crisis workers are MAs.
"This is doctor so and so and I want my client put in the hospital"
"Well, this is doctor .... and your client has to have a crisis evaluation after which we will see what happens." They shut up when they realize they're talking to another PhD.
I got in a lot of trouble for not respecting the hierarchy. In fact, I got fired for that back in 2006. But I don't mind because I saved a life, and now that I am gone from there it's the best thing that could have happened to me.
The last straw for them was an MD complaining that I had nixed his diagnosis of substance abuse/DTs for a woman who said that she was maintaining her sobriety. She came in saying that she was hearing things. She was having some other symptoms that the MD diagnosed as intoxication. They were going to send her home. On questioning her I found that she was hearing what sounded like voices coming from her counter. What was opposite the counter? Her gas stove. I asked how long since the stove had been inspected. It had not since she'd moved in. How long ago? 20 years. I told the doc I thought that she had carbon monoxide poisoning. He said, "She'd have a headache. She doesn't have a headache." I went back and asked the woman if her head felt funny at all. She said that she had what felt like a tight band around her head. I went back to the doc and said, "She does have a headache." He questioned her, did a blood test for carbon monoxide. It was off the charts - so high that they sent the fire department to her house to shut off the gas because of the risk of explosion.
The woman thanked me, but later I heard that the MD had called to complain about me. Later that week they fired me for arriving late to the crisis assessment. I'd had to pick up my car from the shop (they knew this) before the assessment, and that made me about 15 minutes later than I had said I would be there.