Walden University - Psychology

Deceptive Enrollment

By: Anonymous (In Progress) on May 2, 2008

Materials:		Teachers:
Institution:		Support:
Value:		Technology:

Review:

Please be very careful when choosing this school for the clinical PhD in applied psychology if you have any hope of becoming licensed to practice. Note: Walden is NOT APA accredited.

During consultation with the enrollment counselor, I was given a list of approximately 12 states that I was told "look favorably" at Walden graduates and permit students to take licensure exams, including two which I am interested in, namely Florida and New Jersey. I was even told that NJ State Board of Psychological Examiners was “highly impressed” with the quality of Walden graduates.

First a little background information about what you can expect from the time you inquire online. You WILL receive a phone call in 24 hours. You WILL have a difficult time making direct calls back. You WILL be contacted several times a week, for at least two weeks. Once you submit your application you WILL be pressured to enroll at the next quarter.

Part of the sales methodology of Walden is to push a person to commit to beginning studies quickly. The process from time of first consultation to when they first asked for a commitment, in my case, was two weeks. The enrollment "advisory" personnel will NOT provide any information about faculty, research interests, or allow any form of contact outside of the sales department. Also, they like to speak in terms of states ultimately "having" to accept online learning schools credentials, citing a lack of human services professionals in the future. 

I wrote to two State Licensing Boards and received the following responses:

Florida Department of Health writes, "I am unaware of any instance in which the Board has looked favorably upon an applicant, outside of the above exceptions, who did not graduate from an APA-accredited program." The exceptions are listed on the website and do not pertain to Walden University.

The Executive Director of the NJ State Board writes, "to be honest, very few graduates of Walden University have obtained a license to practice psychology in the State of New Jersey." I shared with the Executive Director my intention to STAY AWAY from Walden and was given the following response, “I'm glad you have been so diligent in exploring the possibilities. Would that others had been so careful.” Although the door is not closed to Walden students, it is not exactly common, or even likely. 

Don't even get me started on what I was able to uncover about the faculty turnover at Walden.