Author Archives: Heather Dade

About Heather Dade

Heather Dade is the Associate Director for Meetings and Communications in APA's Center for Education in Psychology. She is the Managing Editor of gradPSYCH Blog.

Writing About Psychological Science for the General Public

REPOST from the APA Psychological Science Agenda | November 2015

From The Science Student Council

Writing about psychological science for the general public

Considerations and strategies for effectively sharing your research with the world.

By Daniel R. Rovenpor

Imagine the following scenario: You spent years working on a project that aimed to produce a novel data-driven insight into a problem in the world. Then, with some luck, your work is successful and your insight gets published in a prestigious academic psychology journal. You hope that many people will see your article and learn about your insight, but you know that the chances are slim that the average person will see your article in an academic journal. This discrepancy between psychology’s potential to do good in the world and the fact that only a small fraction of the world’s population reads our journals is often frustrating. How can psychological scientists communicate to a broad audience? There are a number of ways to do this, including teaching, community outreach and advocacy. This article focuses on another way: writing for the general public.

Emerald | Three Steps to your Perfect Thesis Pitch

Source: Emerald | Three Steps to your Perfect Thesis Pitch

Internship and Postdoc Sites Share LGBTQ Climate and Training Data

What does the site you’re applying to say about its LGBTQ training opportunities and affirmative environment? (Source: Kurious on Pixabay. Some rights reserved.)

Are you applying for internship?

Are you interested in finding out more about LGBTQ climate and training opportunities at internship and postdoctoral sites?

If so, check out our new resource created by the APAGS Committee on Sexual Orientation and Gender Diversity and Division 44’s Student Representatives! (Special thanks go to Julia Benjamin, Skyler Jackson, Elizabeth Ollen, and Eric Samuels for their leadership on this project, and to willing training directors for their time and insight.)

We conducted a survey on APPIC-registered internship and postdoctoral sites this summer with the intent of collecting information about how friendly these sites were for people of diverse sexual orientations and genders, and about LGBTQ-focused internship training opportunities that the site might offer.

We received responses from 120 internship sites, 22 postdoctoral sites, and 45 combined internship and postdoctoral sites, from a total of 36 states as well as Washington DC, and three Canadian provinces.

Feel free to explore and manipulate the Excel file here! (last updated 10-1-2015)

You’ll be prompted to download an Excel file after clicking the link above.
Please note that the file has two sheets; the first is introductory and the second is raw survey data.
Note: If you can’t open .xlsx files, you can first download the file and then use a free online site (like this one) to convert the file to other formats, such as .csv or .pdf.

Data points are organized into broad categories including information on general site information, health insurance, staff diversity trainings, expression of identity, LGBTQ training focus, LGBTQ climate for clients, and overall area and site LGBTQ-friendliness. Additionally, for ease of reading, colors have been used to signify specific answer types.

In finding a site that is right for you, we encourage you to consider all sites in their totality, across domains presented here and in combination with other factors available in the APPIC directory and materials made available by each site. Further, we ask that you refrain from making conclusions about sites that did not or could not complete our survey by its deadline.

APAGS CSOGD and Division 44 plan to periodically update this database to provide the most up-to-date information for internship applicants. We hope you find it to be a helpful resource!

Editor’s note: Other APAGS tools that might help intern and postdoc applicants include webisodes on the APPIC application process, a climate guide (PDF) in workbook format for evaluating sites independently on LGBTQ criteria, a new resource guide for LGBTQ students, and much more.

APAGS Releases a Brand New Guide for LGBT Graduate Students

“Proud and Prepared: A Guide for LGBT Students Navigating Graduate Training” was printed in limited release last month, and is now available to all members and affiliates of APA for free download!

APAGS-CSOGD Chair Julia Benjamin reacts to receiving "Proud and Prepared."

APAGS-CSOGD Chair Julia Benjamin reacts to receiving a copy of “Proud and Prepared,” which her committee worked on tirelessly for several months.

This exclusive resource guide was produced by the APAGS Committee on Sexual Orientation and Gender Diversity (CSOGD). Despite the popularity of the committee’s first edition — it had been downloaded and shared thousands of times — it was nine years old. The new guide places emphasis on more subgroups of the LGBT community and offers broader discussion of this community’s modern training concerns. It also embeds dozens of in-depth quotes, pictures and candid perspectives from real students on a multitude of topics.

Authored by current graduate students from a diversity of backgrounds, training programs and viewpoints, “Proud and Prepared” aims to capture the energy and vitality of LGBT graduate students to the profession. Artistically, the guide was designed in-house by talented APA staff and showcases our dynamic content in a colorful 67-page package.

Go ahead and take a sneak peak!

Check out some of Proud and Prepared’s awesome new sections:

Assessing Your Program’s Climate
Self-Disclosure in Graduate School
The Importance of Social Support
Mentorship and LGBT Students
Tips for Transgender or Gender Variant Students
Tips for Bisexual Graduate Students
LGBT Advocacy and Confronting Discrimination
Conducting LGBT Research
Resources for LGBT Students
APA’s Ethical Codes of Interest to LGBT Students

If you are looking for relevant information related to climate, mentorship, self-disclosure, research implications and much more, download the full guide (PDF, 3.3MB) for further reading. Your APA Member login is required. If you are not a member, consider joining today.

Hoffman Report: Two More Resources and a Request

Since our latest posts on APA’s Independent Review (better known as the Hoffman Report), here is where we’ve been focusing our energies:

1. APAGS created a dedicated page (gradpsychblog.org/ir) where we’ve attempted to compile requests from students who came forward with specific concerns and questions. The list will be frequently updated, and we hope you find it useful.

2. APAGS members have assembled a student-focused town hall at APA’s Convention this coming week in Toronto. On Friday 8/7 from 2 to 2:50pm, come to room 707 in the Convention Centre to share your concerns, discuss potential solutions, and hear from your peers. The dialogue will intentionally be structured in a safe and constructive way.

Click to access Student-Town-Hall-One-Pager.pdf

3. Finally, we are asking all students to fill out a feedback survey from APAGS Chair Emily Voelkel. The survey will be open for a week following Convention. YOUR feedback will help guide the ways that APAGS leaders advocate to APA’s Board of Directors and membership council, and it will inform how APAGS sets its own course as a committee and constituency. A summary of results will be posted on this blog. The following word cloud shows common reactions to the findings of the Hoffman Report, as reported by the first three hundred responders.

wordle 3

Thank you for being a part of APAGS during this difficult time. Please keep bringing your opinions to the forefront.