2007 Annual Reports for Boards and Committees

American Psychological Association of Graduate Students

Carol Williams-Nickelson, PsyD
Associate Executive Director

Heather Dade
Communications and Marketing Manager

APAGS is the single largest continuing committee and one of the largest constituency groups of the APA, as well as the largest organized group of psychology graduate students worldwide. 

What follows is a summary of APAGS activities during 2007: 

• The APAGS Convention Committee along with APAGS Staff developed another stellar slate of APAGS Convention programming at the 2007 Annual APA Convention in San Francisco. APAGS offered a wide variety of convention programs central to graduate student needs. For a complete listing of the 2007 APAGS Convention Programming, visit: http://www.apa.org/apags/convention/APAGS2007Guide.pdf.

• APAGS continues to receive a steady stream of requests to conduct Internship Workshops/Focus Groups on various campuses and at conferences nationwide.  This spring, Dr. Carol Williams-Nickelson conducted Internship Workshops at Arizona State University, the California Psychological Association, and the Kentucky Psychological Association.

• APAGS Committee members participated in the 2007 Spring and Fall Consolidated meetings. The APAGS Committee also participated in the APAGS Strategic Planning Meeting in June to do an in depth review and update of the APAGS Strategic plan, which directs all APAGS activities.

• APAGS attended the Council of Credentialing Organizations in Professional Psychology (CCOPP) meeting  as well at the Psychology Executives Roundtable (PER) and Trilateral Forum, held in Montreal in May 2007.

• The APAGS Committee reviewed and rated more than 140 applications for various APAGS awards, grants and scholarships for 2007.

• The ballot period for the 2007 APAGS elections took place in March of this year. 

• APAGS met with the Science Student Council (SSC) at the Spring Consolidated Meeting to determine ways to identify and realize common goals between the two groups and to better serve the needs of science-identified graduate students.

• The new Training and Education Journal contains an article written by APAGS Committee Members and the APAGS AED regarding APAGS’ views of the current internship imbalance issue. The reference for the article is:
• Madson, M.B., Hasan, N.T., Williams-Nickelson, C., Kettmann, J.J., & Van Sickle K.S. (2007). The internship supply and demand issue: Graduate students’ perspective.  Training and education in professional psychology, 1(4), 249-257.

• APAGS collaborated with APA’s Center for Workforce Analysis and Research (CPWAR) to develop Quick Opinion Polls for Students  (QuiPS), to provide a means for gathering APAGS members’ opinions quickly across a range of topics. The data gathered will be used to inform the decision-making of the APAGS office and CPWAR, but will also be relevant for other directorates within APA.

• The APA Membership/Marketing Department has been working alongside APAGS to develop and launch a branding campaign for APAGS that will increase APAGS’ visibility among students and faculty. The slogan for the new campaign is APAGS: Your future in psychology begins here.

• APAGS Central Office hired two new staff members: Lauren Kohari joined the APAGS team as the APAGS Administrative and Meetings Coordinator in May 2007 and Donald Knight, MA, was hired as the Electronic Communications, Database and Research Manager in November 2007.

• In December, seventeen APAGS members participated in a one-day advocacy training sponsored by the Education Directorate’s Government Relations Office. After the training, students went to Capitol Hill where they met with their Senators and/or Representatives on behalf of graduate students in psychology.

• APAGS completed the book Studying Psychology in the United States: Expert Guidance for International Students (edited by Nadia T. Hasan, APAGS Chair, Nadya A. Fouad, Professor at University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, and Carol Williams-Nickelson, APAGS Associate Executive Director). Resources on financing education, handling visa and work permit matters, and securing internships are included. The book is published by and available through APA Books.

• The APAGS Committee on Ethnic Minority Affairs (APAGS-CEMA) met at APA Headquarters to discuss future projects and initiatives, and the needs of Ethnic Minority graduate students in psychology. The Committee is also in the process of re-launching the CEMA Peer Mentoring Project, which pairs ethnic minority students with psychology mentors.

• The APAGS Committee on Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender Concerns met at APA Headquarters to discuss LGBT psychology graduate student needs, future APAGS-CLGBT projects, and to define the APAGS-CLGBTC role with other groups such as Divisions 44 and 45, and Affirm. APAGS-CLGBTC has also developed an LGBT mentoring program designed to provide opportunities for LGBT graduate students in psychology to be mentored by colleagues who share similar interests and experiences. 

• The APAGS Advocacy Coordinating Team continued to disseminate APA Legislative Action Alerts through the APAGS-ACT network.  The ACT network continues to respond to these alerts with multiple waves of targeted calls and emails to legislators.

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