Contact:
Art Warmoth, Ph.D. (art.warmoth@sonoma.edu) - Chair
Charles Merrill, Ed.D. (charles.merrill@sonoma.edu) - Psychology Graduate Coordinator
Graduate Admissions Coordinator (psychma@sonoma.edu)

Programs & Degrees Offered:
M.A. - Art Therapy; Depth Psychology; Humanistic/Transpersonal Psychology; Organization Development

Accreditation:
WASC / CHTP

Admission Requirements:
Bachelor’s (Psychology Major desired)
Test:  NA
Other:  Reference Letters / Program Proposal / Personal Statement / Interview

Cost & Program Information:
$10,000 (Humanistic) / $15,000 (average for Art Therapy, Depth Psychology and Organization Development).  All programs are 36 semester units.
Online Degree Program Available:  No
On-Campus/External/Distance Leaning:  Mainly On-Campus, Limited External/Distance Learning.  Programs are two years except for Art Therapy, which is three years.
Public/Private:  Public
Year Established:  1972
Number of Faculty:  14 Full-Time, plus Lecturers
Thesis:  Required (except Organization Development)
Admission Deadline:  Priority deadline is January 31.  Applications are accepted after that date until cohort targets are completed.

Enrollment:
Current Enrollment:  Varies by program specialization
Part Time/Full Time:  50% full-time in all programs
Female/Male:  75% (F) / 25% (M)
Alumni (1990-2003):  150

Mission Statement:
The Psychology Department at Sonoma State University is distinguished by its focus on the quality of human experience.  The key words here are distinguished, quality, human, and experience.  For us, each of these words holds special significance.  “Distinguished”  expresses both that the department is unique and that it has achieved a certain amount of renown for this uniqueness over the years.  This department offered one of the first graduate programs in Humanistic Psychology and also helped to pioneer that field, with four of our members having served as president of the Association for Humanistic Psychology, an international organization.  The department also has been distinctive for its pioneering work in such areas as somatics, expressive arts, biofeedback, organizational development, wilderness psychology, Jungian/Archetypal psychology, Transpersonal psychology, interdisciplinary learning, student-directed learning, experiential learning, and learning-community approaches.  This difference, this distinctiveness, has led to a national and, even, international reputation.  The department has stood out as a beacon for many students seeking an alternative to traditional psychology, including even doctoral level professionals who've returned to take undergraduate courses here.  “Quality” carries a number of important messages.  First of all, we are interested in quality, as in excellence.  At the same time, we are struck that the word, quality, is in ascendance, in business and elsewhere, even as we see ourselves surrounded by the deteriorating quality of our physical, social, and economic environments.  Technology, for example, is changing the face of our world, but is it enhancing the quality of our lives?  We seek to develop a psychology that not only studies but, also, enhances the quality of life.  The word, quality, also communicates something about our bias in favor of valuing qualitative research methods at least equally with quantitative ones.  While affirming our connectedness to all of life, our interdependence with all creatures, “Human” this word clearly communicates our bias toward studying uniquely human, rather than animal, phenomena.  “Experience” communicates a tendency for our department to take seriously the subjective realm, rather than focusing exclusively on the objective, as so much of mainstream psychology has tended to do.  Our approach to investigation is often phenomenological.  In addition, our approach to teaching tends to emphasize experiential approaches to learning, when possible, both inside and outside of the classroom.