Any All-But-Dissertation (ABD) Doctorate in Psychology (Psy.D./Ph.D.) programs?

[PositiveSoul]

I have completed all the coursework for my Doctorate in Clinical Psychology (Psy.D.) and would like to explore All-But-Dissertation (ABD) Doctorate in Psychology (Psy.D./Ph.D.) completion programs.

Please recommend those accredited universities in the United States and Europe that let you finish your doctorate in psychology by completing the dissertation portion only if you are already done with the coursework at a non-APA-accredited university in the United States. Thank you.

[bjcheung77]

Just curious, if you've completed all the required courses for your current program at the respective university you studied at, don't they have a degree for Psy.D ready for you to apply for graduation? What is the reason for going to another university? Why the change? Is the program not offered online and you can't go on site to defend your dissertation or something along the lines? Are you trying to re-use these credits for a similar degree? Can you explain further?

[Silvious]

Sounds like you are trying to rinse your non-APA credit toward licensure. Your best bet would be to transfer to some foreign program and evaluate it back in. The UK is notable for these types of top-up degrees that may help your search: https://www.tees.ac.uk/postgraduate_cour...op-up).cfm

[eLearner]

"Credit-rinsing". I think we have a new term. I like it.

[sanantone]

Sounds like you are trying to rinse your non-APA credit toward licensure. Your best bet would be to transfer to some foreign program and evaluate it back in. The UK is notable for these types of top-up degrees that may help your search: https://www.tees.ac.uk/postgraduate_cour...op-up).cfm

I don't think this will work for the OP's situation. 

You should have:
• MSc (or equivalent) in the field of psychology
• be a Health Care and Professions Council (HCPC) registered practitioner psychologist (you will be required to maintain HCPC
registration throughout the course)
• have a minimum of two years’ experience working in an applied psychology field of practice
• be engaged in current psychological practice
• have an agreed research supervisory team in place
• have an agreed research project plan that fits within the research themes of the psychology department staff, and which has been
agreed by the research supervisory team

[Alpha]

I like these sorts of questions because I always seem to learn something new.  I only have a couple of things to add at this point.  The first is that I do not know of any US university that does what you're looking for.  The second is that while you may find a non-US university to accept all your credits and simply allow you to write a dissertation, some of these educational systems (such as the Commonwealth system) have dissertation requirements that extend far beyond what one normally finds in US universities.  Furthermore, even if you found a school to do this and even if you actually finished the process, and even if the degree was assessed to be equivalent to a US doctoral degree, you still might not be allowed to sit for the licensing exam.

[sanantone]

Chanel1 on the other forum graduated from CalSouthern and decided to complete all of their SPE hours after graduation, which California allows. I think their advice is solid if you want to keep the doors open for licensure.

To recap, we discussed Capitol Technology University and Oklahoma State University. There are multiple ABD programs in the U.S. for education and business and even one in computer science, but I haven't seen one for psychology. Your closest option for an ABD in psychology would be CapTech since the program accepts 42 transfer credits and is dissertation-only. You said that you've already talked to them, and they confirmed that they will accept 42 of your credits. The problem with CapTech is that it is more expensive than CalSouthern, it is not designed for licensure, and it is just as unknown as CalSouthern.

The OSU option is a Doctor of Forensic Sciences with an emphasis in Forensic Psychology. The catalog hasn't been updated, but the core will be 18 credits of general forensic science courses. They'll likely accept 30 transfer credits from your CalSouthern education. Then, the remaining 12 credits will be OSU's forensic psychology courses. OSU is cheap and is a state university that might have a better reputation than CalSouthern and CapTech, but it's ranked #182 nationally. It's not up there with UCLA or University of Michigan, so I'm not sure that it would be worth it to transfer for only a slightly better name. OSU's program is also not intended for licensure, so I am not sure whether California would recognize it as a qualifying degree.

https://www.psychology.ca.gov/licensees/...0are%20the

[siersema]

Forensic psychology is a great emphasis area. I would love to seem them add digital forensics as an emphasis. Below appears to be the current options of emphasis, assuming they are the same for the PhD and DFS.

https://medicine.okstate.edu/forensics/doctoral/

[sanantone]

Forensic psychology is a great emphasis area.  I would love to seem them add digital forensics as an emphasis. Below appears to be the current options of emphasis, assuming they are the same for the PhD and DFS.

https://medicine.okstate.edu/forensics/doctoral/

They currently only offer two digital forensics courses. It would be cool if they added more. They added a couple of psychology of terrorism courses. Their catalog is not up to date; the last time I checked, they still hadn't added the required capstone course to the list of required courses. 

According to the program coordinator, none of the emphases are official. They will not be on your transcript. They have students select an emphasis so that they can be paired up with the appropriate advisor. It's expected that your electives will align with your emphasis, but it's not required. Mainly, your capstone will be in your chosen area of study, and you might have to do a special topics course with your advisor depending on who it is.

[siersema]

I emailed and was sent current courses. They now list four courses under forensic psychology. Forensic psych, advanced, behavior analysis, and victimology. I was happy to see that they have four courses for digital forensics now too.