[split] "Good luck being a real psychologist without a degree"

[Efs]

You think too much.

[xcriteria]

(07-12-2014 11:36 PM)Efs Wrote:  You think too much.

I've been told that before. This is a much better way to learn psychology than college, in my experience.

What would you say is the right amount to think?

---

I'm curious... did you appreciate anything in my analysis, or disagree with any of it?

Interacting on the forums has a lot more value when people actually interact, rather than issue one-line responses that basically imply, "I'm not going to participate in a conversation about this."

Care to add anything?

Feeling:

[Efs]

(07-12-2014 11:40 PM)xcriteria Wrote:  

(07-12-2014 11:36 PM)Efs Wrote:  You think too much.

I've been told that before. This is a much better way to learn psychology than college, in my experience.

What would you say is the right amount to think?

---

I'm curious... did you appreciate anything in my analysis, or disagree with any of it?

Interacting on the forums has a lot more value when people actually interact, rather than issue one-line responses that basically imply, "I'm not going to participate in a conversation about this."

Care to add anything?

Feeling:

Good luck being a real psychologist without a degree.

[School]

(07-13-2014 12:01 AM)Efs Wrote:  

(07-12-2014 11:40 PM)xcriteria Wrote:  

(07-12-2014 11:36 PM)Efs Wrote:  You think too much.

I've been told that before. This is a much better way to learn psychology than college, in my experience.

What would you say is the right amount to think?

---

I'm curious... did you appreciate anything in my analysis, or disagree with any of it?

Interacting on the forums has a lot more value when people actually interact, rather than issue one-line responses that basically imply, "I'm not going to participate in a conversation about this."

Care to add anything?

Feeling:

Good luck being a real psychologist without a degree.

Got my BA in Psych and my MSW. Plenty of people who went through the college are not fit to be psychologists or therapists. It's unreal. I have seen internet armchair Psychologists with no degree that are much better than those that went through the years of school.

Unless you are being very literal meaning the law prevents him from practicing because he lacks a degree...

[xcriteria]

(07-13-2014 12:01 AM)Efs Wrote:  Good luck being a real psychologist without a degree.

Interesting. How would you define a real psychologist?

It's possible to do the equivalent things -- counseling/coaching/consulting -- without traditional credentials.

Quite a few people are questioning the value and benefits of traditional degrees, especially in a world where much of the content and many of the kinds of experiences that college can facilitate, can be obtained elsewhere.

From Harvard Business Review:

The Degree Is Doomed, by Michael Staton.

"Higher education, however, is in the midst of dramatic, disruptive change. It is, to use the language of innovation theorists and practitioners, being unbundled. (Some more of my thoughts on higher-ed unbundling can be found here.) And with that unbundling, the traditional credential is rapidly losing relevance. The value of paper degrees lies in a common agreement to accept them as a proxy for competence and status, and that agreement is less rock solid than the higher education establishment would like to believe."

"The value of paper degrees will inevitably decline when employers or other evaluators avail themselves of more efficient and holistic ways for applicants to demonstrate aptitude and skill. Evaluative information like work samples, personal representations, peer and manager reviews, shared content, and scores and badges are creating new signals of aptitude and different types of credentials."

It's been my experience that traditional mental health professionals are often missing large amounts of insight into what people need, and how to most effectively help them -- just as with traditional education.

This seems especially true for the population School Survival appeals to... that is, "school-averse learners" or what Roz Hussin calls "cognitive refugees."

I suppose one thing it all comes down to is whether I could get anyone to pay me as a coach/consultant/counselor -- and that's certainly easier with a traditional credential. But, I've found a lot of people who are doing different forms of this "getting paid to interact with an expert" thing, regardless of, and even despite any formal credentials they might have.

Also, one thing I have in mind is to collaborate with people who [i]do[i] have traditional credentials, as I've already started to somewhat.

The question is, in the end, how to provide real and perceived value to people, by giving them things they want or helping them with problems.

Thoughts on that?

I've been meaning to post a sort of support request in DoA's thread that explains a bit about my story so far, and my frustration with figuring out next steps and both being discounted for not being a "professional," but also accused of things like over-thinking, paying too much attention to things, or even taking too many people's perspectives into account.

That's how my mind works, that's what I enjoy doing, and I very much want to find a path in life where I can earn a living doing that in productive ways.

I get "good luck" a lot, but maybe the better response is, what's it going to take?

[Efs]

You're lucky I skimmed through what you just posted because it's all irrelevant.

To practise psychology, to actually be labelled as a psychologist and to work as a psychologist you need not only a bachelors degree, but a post-graduate degree as a minimum.

You can debate all you want about traditional degrees being a waste of time, which are valued nothing more than "a piece of paper" but that piece of paper shows the world you are a psychologist, and without it you aren't.

[xcriteria]

To actually use the word "psychologist" to market yourself, in some places, you do need credentials.

But, it's possible to do the same basic kinds of work, and provide value to clients that they're willing to pay for, under other words like coach, consultant, counselor, mentor, mediator, curator, diagnostician, "person who interacts with people and applies their expertise to their situations," and so on.

I want to help people with many of the same problems people go to psychologists for, but do so in a way that's more helpful than traditional psychology paradigms. That means it's possible to do marketing that shows an actual advantage for coming from a different background than the school->college->gradschool->office pathway that leaves many professionals blind to a lot of real-life things.

The question of how you show the world what you can do is a critical one, and it's harder if you're not slipping into a well-defined category, but it's still possible, especially with the Internet.

Does that make sense?

[Sunbourn]

xcriteria: shady back alley degreeless pseudo-psychologist

jkjk

He actually brings up a lot of good points. If somebody performs the same role that a psychologist does just as if not more competently than the average psychologist with a degree, shouldn't that person be held in the same regard? Attitudes are changing quickly. That piece of paper might not be so important in the future now that people have the means to educate themselves without it, and more people are waking up to this fact all the time.

Degrees should be set aside in exchange for examining people based on their merits. If somebody demonstrates that they know everything that somebody who acquires a degree would know and that they're able to handle patients just as well, why force them to spend a mind-boggling amount of time and money on school?