Characteristics of graduate professional education: expectations and experiences in psychology and law

This paper argues that there are some common characteristics that define what we label graduate professional programmes. By analysing two programmes, law and psychology-as experienced by the students-it becomes obvious that while the programmes educate their students well in the academic aspects of professional work, they do not prepare students sufficiently for dealing with moral conflicts and complex moral challenges. Although there are substantial differences between the two programmes, they reflect cultural characteristics of the academy with its emphasis on the authority of disciplinary knowledge. The findings suggest that while there are critical challenges for professional graduate programmes to keep up to date with the academic content, there are also even larger challenges in preparing students more adequately for dealing with practical and moral issues.