The Feeling of Applying to Graduate School-Dr. Rob McKenna

As you are now deep in the season of writing your applications to graduate school, I just wanted to touch base and say hello.  I can still remember that process like it was yesterday.  Before there were electronic applications, you had to create piles for each school just to keep it all straight.  I had lots of piles in a room in my house, that each represented a school, my essay about why I belonged there, my letters of recommendation, and the basic applications.  It was a challenging process, but at the same time, it taught me so much about myself.  Both the application process and the weeding out process (for me and the schools) taught me a lot about how I show up when something matters to me, what I value in graduate school, how I view research in the context of organizations, and how I deal with both acceptance and rejection. It was a challenging time, but a really important time.  I remember celebrating the acceptance letters I wanted, rolling my eyes at the acceptance letters I didn’t want, being frustrated by the rejection letters I didn’t want, and being equally frustrated by the schools that rejected me that I didn’t want to go to anyway (because maybe they should have known betterJ). 

In all the feelings that will come to you over the coming weeks and months, I hope that this will be a time of great insight.  Insight about the schools to which you’ve applied, insight about what you want, insight about what you would sacrifice, and insight about who you are, where you excel, and insight about why you are. 

Whether you end up at Seattle Pacific University studying Industrial/Organizational Psychology, or somewhere else, may this be an incredible time of blessing and learning for you and for those close to you.