Opinions on SCUPS?

Which affects the status and utility of the degree not one iota.

 

Ah, That explains it. In New york, you can apprentice to a lawyer if you first pass the first year at an ABA law school. Somewhat similar.

 

Steve, I wonder I might pick your mind. I don’t want you to misinterpret my question as an attempt to sandbag you so I’ll fess up, right up front, that I’m a supervisor in an APA internship program. The internship has become a roadblock for many aspiring psychologists; match day was two weeks ago and our training director’s anecdotal feedback is that lots of folk didn’t match and wound up going to the clearing house. From what interns tell me it’s tough for people from APA approved programs and even tougher for folk from programs that are RA but not APA approved. How is the internship market for programs with neither? How do SCUPS students secure internships?

 

I agree fully with Rich.

Another example: A friend of mine was enrolled with SCUPS and managed to complete his DBA in 9 months flat. It was an open book (multiple choice) kind of thing. This was few years ago.

I was not impressed because it took me more then 4 years to complete my RA Ph.D.

Another issue related to the company I work for: SCUPS degrees are not accepted by our HR department because it is not regionally accredited. This should tell you something about its utility in the market.

Eli

 

Rich Douglas - you are misinformed about the ODA rejecting all of SCUPS' degrees except the PhD in Psy. Mr. Contreras has posted on here before that the PhD is the only degree posted on his site because only one person with a degree from SCUPS, one with a PhD in Psy, had his or her program evaluated by the ODA. If the ODA has approved the PhD in Psy, it would surely approve the PsyD and other degrees if the programs were reviewed.

And a slam on you, because you evidently like slamming on others with out just cause, the doctorate programs at Duke are not under review (or on notice) for possible substandard requirements as those of the university where you profess you obtained your PhD. I could run with that. Maybe you were able to get your PhD because it was not up to standard academic quality like those you acuse SCUPS as having.

I guess the ODA has reviewed all of the other unaccredited schools' degrees it has listed as acceptable, but not likely. If the truth be known, I would speculate that why SCUPS is picked on because of the issue of them using some text of John Bear's out of context in the past and he continues to have ill feelings, thus his friends and supporters will have the same. And I find it quite interesting that the Head of the ODA of Oregon gets personal opinions from individuals about schools and not obtaining factual information from the direct sources.

You admit you have never taken a course with SCUPS, so you can't be a judge or present a factual opinion about the courses or programs the school offers. And for you to state that it is substandard school based on personal opinion reveals the quality of your opinions. Not qualifiable.

Eli - I can't speak about the DBA from SCUPS, but I know that in the Psy D program, there is a lot of research to complete, course assignments, 3 comprehensive proctored exams at certain phases in the program, and final exams for each course. To fulfill the course requirements, it took an average of 20 - 25 hours of study each week. The courses at SCUPS are structured in a fashion similar to those I completed at Duke. The APA format is required for all writings. It will come back to you if it is not and points will be taken off if you do not use the APA format correctly. Just for a personal note to you, I went for my second doctorate because I wanted to take courses in clinical psychology. Working full time, I could not do this in a traditional curriculum with start and finish dates and time constraints in turning in projects. The tuition at SCUPS is about the same thing it is here for in-state tuition at our NC schools. The reason I did not pursue the clinical degree here in NC is #1 there are no schools here that offer a doctorate in clinical psychology (only 1 that offers the PhD) and the programs are not offered via DL. Capella and UoP had high tuition rates and semester time limits and onsite residencies out of state in which I could not attend. If I lived outside of CA, I would not earn my Bachelor's degree from a school that is not RA. It is not that I am knocking the State Approved programs, but the utility of the RA undergraduate degrees are accepted most everywhere.

 

David:

Greetings,

The Academic Advisor assigned to the student assists in obtaining the internship. A contract has to be established between the place the internship will be completed and SCUPS. The student picks the place the internship is conducted, local MHC, private psych facilities, public MH hospitals, etc. The supervising psychologist or psychiatist at the facility the internship is completed has to be licensed and fill out reports on the intern and sent directly to SCUPS.

I don't why it is so difficult in your area for interns to find suitable placement. Usually, there is a huge demand for psych staff in public psychiatric hospitals and DD/MR centers and most will assist in any way they can to hopefully recruit the interns once they have graduated and become licensed. I am not pursuing licensure. I just wanted a knowledge of clinical psychology and practices being that I manage a psych facility.

 

Steve,

Unfortunately, if one is licensed to practice as a mental health or professional counselor with a masters degree they are not allowed by law in the majority of states to market or refer to themselves as a "doctor" if the doctorate in psychology or counselor education is not from a regionally accredited institution.

 

Hi Steve,

The fraudulent lying by SCUPS in the past is rarely mentioned here, but thanks for mentioning it.

I don't have to have ever taken a class at SCUPS to know that they failed at their attempt to get accredited. It is simple logic to conclude that they are a substandard unaccredited school. It is simple logic to conclude that they are going to remain an unaccredited substandard school for the foreseeable future. Not going there perhaps helps me to understand the obvious truth of the situation.

 

Steve Hutchinson:
"If the truth be known, I would speculate that why SCUPS is picked on because of the issue of them using some text of John Bear's out of context in the past and he continues to have ill feelings, thus his friends and supporters will have the same."

John Bear:
No, you've got it all wrong, Mr. Hutchinson. SCUPS most emphatically did not use some of my text out of context. They completely rewrote my text, to make it seem as if I were offering very different opinions from my true opinions--making me sound much more positive about SCUPS.

Furthermore, they rewrote, and also attributed to me, much more negative comments on some of their competitors than were my published opinions.

And they distributed this, claiming it had been photocopied from Bear's Guide.

If someone did something like that to you, wouldn't you have ill feelings?

------------------------

For the record, SCUPS is one of very few schools which the prestigious Chronicle of Higher Education has ever listed under a headline that used the term Diploma Mills without putting the term in quotation marks, or using qualifiers ("alleged" etc.). Issue of April 25, 1997.

Headline: Thailand Cracks Down on Diploma Mills

Extracts from text:
"The diploma mills have been doing a growing business here recently, mainly because of Thailand's rapidly expanding economy and an acute shortage of qualified university graduates in many professions..."

"Many Thai government officials have been contacted by diploma mills with offers of honorary degrees, which also carry price tags, typically $12,000 to $20,000."

The five U.S. institutions named in the article are American Coastline University of Louisiana, Kensington University, Summit University of Louisiana, University of America, and Southern California University of Professional Studies.

 

I guess SCUPS doesn't teach how to spell "Raleigh"

Well at a minimum...proofread...

 

Thanks, Steve. I gather that most SCUPS students take the supervised experience option instead of pursuing the integrated internship.

For the interested reader, mainstream psychology training channels students into the internship as opposed to an on-the-job experience. The internship mandates things like weekly didactics and generally offers varied rotations which supervised experience frequently can’t provide. Not all internships are APA approved but even the most superior supervised experience would never be considered the equivalent of an APA-approved internship. One decided downside is that some states do not accept supervised experience in lieu of the internship. Demand has exceeded supply which became a bottleneck the past few years. The Association of Psychology Postdoctoral and Internship Centers (www.appic.org) defines the internship as follows:

A psychology internship is an organized training program which, in contrast to supervised experience or on-the-job training, is designed to provide the intern with a planned, programmed sequence of training experiences. The primary focus and purpose is assuring breadth and quality of training.

Steve, this may not have any utility but, who knows, it might be helpful. You decide. Thirty years ago I made an ill advised decision by pursuing a PhD in counseling. Much to my chagrin it worked to my disadvantage as the reception I received in my job search was lukewarm at best. Employers wanted licensed or license eligible psychologists and I gradually came to discover a bias that went something like ‘what’s wrong with this guy, couldn’t he get into a real psychology program?’ My masters is an MSW and I strongly considered returning to social work just to find a job. Eventually I decided to bite the bullet. I matriculated in a respecialization program although in the end I earned an APA-approved PhD in counseling psychology. I also did an APA-approved internship.

Rocky Balboa’s self-esteem was no higher climbing the steps of the Philadelphia Art Museum than mine the day I walked into the profession through the front door. (Parenthetically, I’m from Southeastern PA and I can say “Yo Adrian” with the right accent. Regrettably, the similarities end there; I can’t box and I never could do a one handed pushup.) I’m close to retirement and in the intervening years I’ve had a terrific career practicing in a med school affiliated teaching hospital. I might have secured a license in some state but what were the chances of realizing my goal with a cobbled together credential? Slim and none. To paraphrase something I once heard Ollie North say, the best decision I ever made was to “Do an about face and double time up the hill.”

By the bye, in what field did you earn the Duke doctorate?