Hampden-Sydney College

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Psychology and Counseling Programs at Hampden-Sydney College

Hampden-Sydney College appears in our ranking of the 50 Great Small Colleges for a Bachelor’s in Psychology.

To help students who want to study psychology and counseling, Hampden-Sydney College encourages students to choose its psychology major. This program looks at both the social and natural sciences and how those sciences affect behavior and the human brain. Some of the students who graduated from this program later earned their doctoral degrees from Virginia Tech, Tulane University, and other major colleges. Majors have access to modern labs with state of the art equipment, including software that they can use to analyze data. Another lab has a one-way mirror that students can use for testing subjects.

Hampden-Sydney College has a branch of the Psi Chi Honor Society on-campus and encourages students to join as soon as they can. It is open to psychology majors with a grade point average of 3.25 or higher who also rank in the top third of their courses. Members can find paid internships through this society that are available during the school year and in the summer. Students also have the option of working for the Journal of the Sciences, which features peer-reviewed articles from psychology majors and professors.

The psychology major asks students to take three lab courses and 10 psychology classes. Each lab course includes opportunities for students to create research experiments to test the theories they create in class. Though Introduction to Psychology is a required course, students can choose from other classes too, including Controversial Issues in Psychology, Motivation, Sport Psychology, Quantitative Methods, Research Methods and The Psychology of Law. Many psychology majors choose a minor in neuroscience too. To complete the minor, they need to take three biology classes and four psychology classes, most of which will count as some of their electives. Some of the biology classes include labs also.

About Hampden-Sydney College

Hampden-Sydney College is a liberal arts college for men in Virginia. Established in 1775, it was named after the town of Hampden Sydney, which its founder picked for its campus and two men who fought for liberty. It is one of the only colleges in the nation that was founded before the United States became a country. Originally known as an academy, it opened as a college that offered classes in Greek, Latin, philosophy and other topics. Students met in several small buildings and continued meeting there until the college built several brick structures later. Though the college faced some financial issues during the Revolutionary War, it remained open and became the first college in the south to receive a charter from the state.

Now known as H-SC, it ranks as one of the only colleges for men in the country. As a liberal arts school, it requires that students take classes in multiple subjects such as communications, writing, and science in addition to their major courses. Out of the nearly 900 schools that Forbes looked at, H-SC was one of the only campuses to receive an A rating. The Princeton Review included the college on its list of the schools with the best alumni networks. H-SC also ranked within the top 100 on the U.S. News and World Report list of the best liberal arts schools. The college has an enrollment of more than 1,100 students and offers more than 40 clubs and organizations for them.

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Hampden-Sydney College Accreditation Details

H-SC can grant financial aid packages to students who use the Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA) because it has regional accreditation. The Southern Association of Colleges and Schools Commission on Colleges (SACSCC) awarded the college this accreditation because it met all of the organization’s accrediting standards. Students will also find this accreditation useful if they need to transfer credits to H-SC or if they decide to go to a different school.

Hampden-Sydney College Application Requirements

At H-SC, students can apply with the Common Application or the Hampden-Sydney College Application. Both ask for the same information from students, including where they live and went to high school, whether they took any college classes and what interests they have outside of school. It takes most students less than an hour to complete the H-SC application. The college lists its school codes online and asks students to give that code to the testing board to make sure that it gets their ACT or SAT scores. They only need to submit one of these scores as part of the application process.

A letter of recommendation from a guidance counselor is an important requirement because this letter shows how prepared the student is for college. H-SC asks for a second letter of recommendation from a teacher who is familiar with the student’s work and how he or she acted in class. Guidance counselors can also submit the student’s transcript. Students can meet either of the two early action deadlines of November first or January 15th, but they can also apply by the middle of November to meet the early decision deadline. H-SC has a final application deadline of February first. Students need to respond to the college and make their final decisions by the beginning of May.

Tuition and Financial Aid

All students attending H-SC pay a full-time enrollment rate of $45,690 each year. They can add more than $10,000 to their annual costs if they plan to study abroad. The room and board packages available from the college start at $8,718 a year. This includes a standard shared dorm room and five meals a week. The most expensive plan costs $16,282 a year but gives students unlimited meals every week and a private/single dorm room. Students are also responsible for paying a comprehensive fee of $2,420 every year too.

The Princeton Review included H-SC on its lists of colleges with the best return on investment for students because it offers affordable tuition rates and lots of financial aid. H-SC has both grants and scholarships for students with a high SAT or ACT score and a good grade point average. It grants a $20,000 scholarship for students who are also leaders and allows them to renew this prize every year. The Madison Scholarship goes to one new student who gave back and helped his community too. Psychology majors attending Hampden-Sydney College can also use the GI Bill, loans, grants and any aid that they get through the FAFSA also.

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