Honors Research Program in Psychology

Proposal

The Psychology Department would like to propose a new undergraduate program that matches the goals of your working group to identify new undergraduate programs to increase enrollment and enrich the curriculum. We call the new program that we are proposing the Honors Research Program in Psychology and it builds on the accomplishments and strengths of our department and would enrich the curriculum and increase undergraduate enrollment.

Description

The Honors Research Program in Psychology would be a targeted toward high school and resumer student prospects that are intellectually talented and highly motivated to pursue a scientific career in psychology research. The goal would be to educate a group of talented students who would be highly qualified upon graduation from Mills to attend competitive scientific research programs at the top university programs in psychology. These students would be selected when they applied to the College for admission to Mills. This program would “fast track” these students into the research programs in the Psychology Department, would create new advanced courses on statistics and the research process in Psychology, provide extended experience in the research laboratories in the department, and culminate in a high quality independent and collaborative research project

Visibility, Institutional Reputation and Enrollment

This program would be unique and attention-capturing. Given the popularity of psychology nation-wide, we could attract a large number of talented students to Mills, with necessary resources added to our existing program. Such a program would be a magnet for bright students and might, as a result of the reputation and success of our graduates, bring talented students interested in sciences like Biology to apply to the College as well. Our department is one half of the popular Biopsychology major and it is likely that our colleagues in Biology and Chemistry would benefit from an influx of students pursuing psychology and biopsychology.

Building on Existing Strengths

The proposed program builds on the strengths of the Psychology Department. Psychology is usually the largest or second largest major at Mills College and the department graduates between 30 and 40 majors per year. The faculty members have active research programs spanning cutting edge research in biopsychology, cognitive psychology, developmental psychology, social psychology, health psychology, infant mental health, and aging. The faculty regularly present and publish their research findings at prestigious conferences and highly ranked journals in psychology, neuroscience, and medicine. Our research programs always include students as research assistants and collaborators. There are currently four laboratories conducting research in the department: the Mills Cognition Lab, the Laboratory of Psychology and Health, the Mills Early Childhood and Family Research Lab, and the Mills Social Psychology Lab. We regularly send students to some of the top universities in the world. We are now getting inquiries from graduate programs where our students have applied or attended to encourage our top students to apply to their graduate schools because our students are exceptionally bright and well-prepared for graduate study in psychology. An Honors program built on these strengths would be a powerhouse and would be recognized as one of the best undergraduate programs for psychology, nationally and internationally, if it were implemented and provided with resources to support research excellence.

Enhancement and Growth

If the Psychology program was able to have enhanced research laboratories, technical equipment, and more faculty members, the curriculum could be expanded to include the courses needed to support honors students. These include the frequently requested advanced courses in statistics and research methods, courses that would also fortify the Infant Mental Health undergraduate Psychology/Master’s degree program. We know from our students that research experience, mentoring, and course offerings are important considerations when choosing Mills. The proposed program would enhance the current Psychology tracks and be in a desirable location to study psychology. Students would be attracted to up-to-date research laboratories, ample course offerings, access to personal mentoring by outstanding faculty, better preparation for a scientific career in research or applied psychology. All of this located in the beautiful San Francisco Bay Area on a campus dedicated to the education of women. Mills mission as a women’s college also more likely to draw students to an outstanding Honors Program in Psychology because women are now earning the majority of doctoral and master’s degrees in the world.