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Good catch -- appears to have been on Friday and the concentration is Sustainable Systems. Judging from prior years, SS seems to be a few days ahead of the other concentrations. Nonetheless, this should be a big week for SNRE decisions based on past results!

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A bit weird, right? SNRE also sends letters via mail, so there are a few variables at play. And since tomorrow is a national holiday in the U.S., it's doubtful we'll hear anything until Tuesday at the earliest.

The more I consider Duke, the more appealing it is, despite the 2 prerequisites I need to take.

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To everyone:

Given you receive the same amount of funding, which one would you choose? Duke's or Yale's MEM program? And why?

Well, Yale would have to give more considering its cost of living is much higher than in Durham. However, you raise a good point.. I visited Duke last week and tried to get an idea of the differences between Yale and Duke. No one I talked to seemed to know.

On paper, I prefer Yale because they have people doing water management. However, my Duke visit was great, and it's apparent the students enjoy the program and have great networking opportunities. I've yet to find out about Yale yet, thus haven't visited. Additionally, a Duke student can take classes at UNC (which has a lot of water people in the School of Public Health). The environmental economists in Duke are really strong from what I've heard/noticed - if that is your desired focus.

Anyone else know distinctions between Duke MEM and Yale MEM?

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Straight answer: No idea. Would be a cool "problem" to have, that's for damn sure.

In terms of curricula and distinctions between the two: Duke is more quantitatively-oriented while Yale is a bit more scattered, and in some cases, research-based. You could conceivably shape your Yale degree to suit your individual interests while you'd be tethered to a selection of courses and paths at Duke. Personally, I don't perceive either to be better than the other in an objective sense -- both offer some great courses and marketable skills. Subjectively, however, I'd give Duke the edge.

Based on employment data (starting salaries), both programs are virtually equal. Duke's career services staff is lauded; not sure about Yale, and don't know how helpful the alumni networks are at either school. There is the Yale/Duke recruiting fair which tacitly suggests that employers consider the pool of Nicholas and FES students to be of similar caliber.

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Schools Applied To: Duke (MEM), CU-Boulder, UCSB-Bren, UC-Berkeley-ERG, UT-Austin-EER Program

Schools Accepted To: Duke

Schools Rejected: UC-Berkeley

Undergraduate Institution: Colorado State University

Undergraduate GPA: 3.9

Undergraduate Major: Forestry/Natural Resource Management

GRE Quantitative Score: 780

GRE Verbal Score: 600

GRE AW Score: 4.0

Years Out of Undergrad (if applicable): 4

Years of Work Experience: 6

Describe Relevant Work Experience: Four summer seasons and two full years with the US Forest Service; enviro consulting firm past two years

Just saw this board after searching around; had previously only taken advantage of the accept/reject portion. Thought Duke was a long-shot, so I'm pretty stoked. Most likely headed to Durham this fall, unless I got a good scholarship at UCSB-Bren or UT-Austin (which I don't consider likely, given their funding situations). I'm from Colorado, so only had CU-Boulder as a safe school.

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Got into Duke! I received an email about coming to admitted students day, and i hadn't received confirmation I was admitted yet. Apparently there was a family emergency with the Director of Admissions and he was unable to put it on applyyourself yet, but they responded saying i was in! So pumped. They told me they would be updated next Monday, so others might be waiting until then as well.

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On paper, I prefer Yale because they have people doing water management.

@jbr00ks9 Duke has a pretty solid water and air concentration, and like you mentioned, the benefit of UNC courses (and possibly NC State, which has a solid hydrology program). Don't you think it's on par with Yale FES for water resources? I didn't apply to Yale, so I'm not quite as familiar with their water offerings as I am with Nicholas.'

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I just heard back yes from U-M... anyone else? No financial aid, but I'm international and they warned on the website that they aren''t really too nice to us out of USAers in terms of $$. I think there are options to apply for aid after acceptance though...

I have some friends in Yale FES and they said we aren't likely to hear earlier than a couple weeks into march bcs of the time it takes to put together the financial aid packages. Yale's my first choice, how about you guys?

Good luck!

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@jbr00ks9 Duke has a pretty solid water and air concentration, and like you mentioned, the benefit of UNC courses (and possibly NC State, which has a solid hydrology program). Don't you think it's on par with Yale FES for water resources? I didn't apply to Yale, so I'm not quite as familiar with their water offerings as I am with Nicholas.'

You make a great point, and I'm thinking I need to compare everything again now that I am more familiar with the programs and websites. I didn't fully explain myself, either - I'm looking at international water management. That being said and with more reflection, I'm not sure how much stronger the international focus is as Yale over Duke. It's something I'm continuing to look into.

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Congrats curlie-sue on the Michigan acceptance.

With regards to international water management: I'd surmise that Yale is more connected to global and international issues. That's not to say you wouldn't obtain excellent scientific and technical training at either school, but Yale could present a few more relevant international pathways (and cases to examine) with a more established global network.

Additionally -- related to taking courses at UNC while at Duke -- I'm very intrigued by the opportunity to take a class or two at Duke Law, as my concentration and track would allow. I don't know how flexible the other schools are in this regard, though. Michigan is ambiguous, stating that your electives must be a 400-level graduate course or higher, so that may span across all programs there, which sounds good.

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I recommend reading Yale Prof. Shimon Anisfeld's book 'Water Resources' it is an excellent introduction to the topic having just finished it and being on the verge of hopefuly studying water resource management somewhere. My impression was that Duke has much more course depth in water related topics but that Yale is more well connected with relevant federal agencies. Finally, students at SOF suggested that Duke is a much younger school (like straight from undergraduate student body) while Yale students tend to have significant work experience. There are probably avg. age statistics to validate this....

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Schools Applied To: Yale (MEM), UC-Boulder(Environmental Studies), SUNY EFS

Schools Accepted To: SUNY EFS

Undergraduate Institution: Stony Brook University

Undergraduate GPA: 3.8

Undergraduate Major: Political Science

GRE Quantitative Score: 158

GRE Verbal Score: 161

GRE AW Score: 5.5

Years Out of Undergrad (if applicable): 1

Years of Work Experience: 2

Describe Relevant Work Experience: I have worked a few political campaigns, both in field and fundraising, but I haven't done much on the environmental front.

Strength of SOP (be honest, describe the process, etc): Biggest obstacle is the lack of experience in environmental work, aside from a few research assistantships in school most of my work has been political. I tried to tie it in with the fact that I have been working to create change in our political system and see this as a way of prepping me to do so on environmental issues.

Luckily some of my political experience was in New Haven, so with the Yale SOP I made the link to wanting to continue being involved in the community.

Strength of LOR (be honest, describe the process, etc): Strong, one from one of the top professors in my department, one from an accomplished businesswoman/political activist, and one from the Mayor of New Haven.

So I'm really shooting for Yale, but pretty happy that I at least got into SUNY ESF, my safe(and cheap) school. Biggest concern with Yale is what the financial aid package is going to look like. I'm extremely debt-averse, so it'll be a tough decision.

For those who mentioned Yale vs Duke, I didn't even consider Duke, so my preference for Yale shows. But I lived there for six months so I think I can share some insight for people who don't know it as well. It's a great city in a lot of ways, great local shops, the people are extremely friendly, and they have a real quirky yet fun political process that actually gives people a way to get involved in their community if they want. The city is also a perfect example of class divisions in the US. On one side of Yale you have East Rock, where the professor's, grad students, and other professionals live. On the other side of Yale there is Newhallville, a straight up ghetto where you can see prostitutes on the street and open drug dealing. And you can't just avoid these areas, just this summer there was a fight that broke out in Newhallville, people drove over into East Rock, and someone was shot dead in broad daylight. That doesn't happen everyday, but it shows that in a city that small, problems are contained to just one area. At the end of the day, I got used to it, and they good that New Haven and Yale have to offer outweigh any discomfort with the crime, but it is something to keep in mind.

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Congrats cunninlynguist and MGrubs!

Looks like SNRE is doing it through the mail this year, which unnecessarily prolongs the wait for those of us overseas.

Thanks!

Seems to be the case, although one of the international acceptances on the results survey indicated an e-mail notification. Either way, this upcoming week should yield a fair number of decisions for Michigan.

Less than 3 weeks remaining for Yale, which is, unsurprisingly, a common thread amongst most of us.

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