« No one informed us or prepared us for this selection process. In my case, I had to face the reality of the situation in the lecture hall of my Master 1 course, when a professor sarcastically announced that no more than 10% of us would be accepted into Master 2, and that the rest would just have to go home. « recalls Anastasia Huard, a Master 2 student in clinical psychopathology, specializing in criminology and victimology, at Poitiers. It’s a harrowing but common story of future psychologists who learn, a year before graduation… that they won’t be psychologists. To better grasp the scale of the phenomenon, let’s recall the context. Training to become a psychologist lasts a minimum of five years (if you don’t have to repeat a year), most of them spent on university benches. To obtain the title, students must pass their bachelor’s degree, their Master’s 1 and also… their Master’s 2. It’s at this final stage that things get tricky. Because psychology faculties, overrun by baccalaureate holders, are naturally unable to issue as many diplomas as they have students. Selection is essential. And most do so at the Master 2 level, more or less in advance, and for more or less official reasons.

Unclear selection criteria

To top it all off, every university is freewheeling.  » Many psychology faculties require a minimum average in Master 1: 13/20 for some, 14/20 for others. Some universities clearly state this on their information brochures, others do not. We find out about it through informal discussions with students and professors. « laments Anastasia Huard.

Other criteria include the choice of future research dissertation, whether or not the student has found a future internship, and the student’s career plan… But that’s not all.I’d been rejected by several universities, despite having an excellent average, » says the student. After insisting to the administrative department of one of them, the employee finally let go: « It’s not your file that’s stuck. It’s just that you’re in a college that’s psychoanalytical, whereas we’re more cognitivist!«  » An argument that flirts with illegitimacy when you consider, firstly, that the theoretical orientation of a university is not written down in black and white, and secondly that, quite often, a baccalaureate holder’s enrolment in an establishment is sectorized and therefore depends on his or her home address.

Rejected by several universities as a Master 2 student, Anastasia Huard decided to complete her training to maximize her chances of being accepted the following year. She opted for two university degrees. To her great surprise, this investment, both human and financial (costing a total of 1,780 euros!), backfired. One university criticized me for being too specialized this time! I couldn’t believe my ears! I was devastated… « .

What are the alternatives?

Clémence Grignon, a clinical psychologist and graduate of the University of Paris Ouest Nanterre La Défense, expresses her indignation in her article « Coup de gueule: la sélection en Master 2″, on her website for psychology students etudepsychologie.com:  » After four years of study, the students are dismissed. (…) They have to fight hard for explanations as to why they were turned down, and face a lot of soul-searching and even depression. « So what happens to students who aren’t selected for a Master 2, who have a Master 1 which, let’s face it, isn’t worth much on today’s perilous job market? Left to their own devices, these students rush through a wide variety of courses, wandering the university benches until they obtain University Diplomas and/or retake a Master 1, multiplying internships in psychology and reorienting themselves.

On the Internet, exchanges on the subject are rife: « I had envisaged several possibilities: a second M1 to complete my baggage and be able to do a complementary internship, try the speech-language pathology competitive examination, reorient myself and do a BPJEPS [Brevet professionnel de la jeunesse, de l’éducation populaire et du sport, n.d.l.r.] to become an animator and work in a retirement home, failing which I would become a psychologist« , confides an Internet user (1).« So for my part… Seeing that I wasn’t going to be accepted into M2, and not wanting to spend a year on stand-by I opted for Belgium with the University of Mons. Of course, I had to retake my M1, but with the opportunity to choose general options and the assurance that I’d be able to go on to M2, because there’s no selection process there! « says another.

Although psychology students are not the only ones to be confronted with this selection process at Master 2 level, they are among the hardest hit.  » In applied foreign languages (LEA), the number of places drops from 3,200 in M1 to 2,000 in M2. In psychology, the number of first- and second-year students is cut in half: 11,000 versus 5,000 places. « , so read an article in Le Monde newspaper in early 2013 (2).

Ideal solutions? They don’t exist. But we do have some ideas on how to improve this organization: « I think we need to develop reorientation, gateways and emergency exits into the medical-social professions, » says Clémence Grignon.

When will universities start communicating officially about this phenomenon? When will students be treated with respect and invested in their training? For psychology specialists, we might expect more… psychology. ∞

(1) These testimonials were collected via Facebook, on the community page La psy contre attaque.
(2) See the article by Sébastien Dumoulin, « Titulaires d’un Master 1 mais refusés en Master 2 », Le Monde, January 30, 2013