Advice applying for Masters in IR in 2016???

[JayKay]

Hi all,

 

Sorry this is long, but I would REALLY appreciate your feedback- I'm lost!

I just received my BA at a top 10 public university in the US and was planning on applying to graduate school in Fall of 2016 for International Relations (security studies primarily).

I've just moved back home and have compiled a spreadsheet of programs/schools I am interested in (GPA, GRE scores, rankings, experience etc) and have become increasingly disheartened at the amount of experience they require.

Most of the programs I am applying to "strongly recommend" 2-3 years relevant work experience or international experience, and I'm curious as to how much weight this holds. 

I would prefer to go straight to grad school rather than waiting an additional year or two, but if the work experience is absolutely necessary, I feel I have no choice but to wait.

What are your thoughts on this? 

Here are some of my stats/info if that gives more perspective on my current position:

 

Age: 21

School: Top 10 public university in California; planning to take microeconomics, macroeconomics, statistics, and possibly calculus at a nearby CC 

Major: Political Science- International Relations, Minor- Russian 

GPA: Cumulative- 3.47 (freshman and beginning of sophomore year were rough, but I averaged a 3.6-4.0 for remainder of college. Averaged 3.8 Senior year)

Languages: Native English speaker, Spanish- 4 years in high school, Russian- 3 years university (advanced)

Internships/leadership experience: Campaign internship for a member of the US House of Representatives, marketing intern 1 year, University elections campaign manager 1 year, University elections head campaign manager 1 year. Internal Project Coordinator for the Internal Vice President of the university, Alumnae and Foundations Liason for established Sorority, Chief Administrative Officer (CAO) for established Sorority 

International experience: Studied abroad in Russia for 6 months, taught English there and volunteered at a rehabilitation clinic for children with social disorders. Backpacked Europe for 1 month in 2014, will be backpacking again for 6 weeks this September/October in Europe and Southeast Asia.

Work experience: 1 year retail, 7-8 years babysitting/nanny, 1-2 years working at Child Care Centers, 2 years at a coffee shop (1 year as Supervisor- ranked top supervisor out of 20, if that matters). 

Honors: Accepted and initiated into national Political Science Honor Society as a founding member at my university, nominated and initiated into national Slavic Honor Society

 

I plan on taking the GRE next year sometime between February and April and am hoping to score over 159 on Verbal and 158 on Quantitive (in a dream world I'd get over 162/161). I'm a nervous standardized test-taker so I've already begun studying.

I am also planning on working for some non-profit (or anything international, really) when I return from Europe and Asia this October, so I would have about 1 year of relevant work experience by the time I apply, and 2 years by the time the program starts in 2017.

 

What are your thoughts? Should I still apply Fall 2016, or focus on getting another year or two of work experience?

Thanks so much, looking forward to hearing your feedback!

 

[KenBesonders]

It depends, as it stands now work experience could really benefit you. Bare in mind one of the main reasons grad schools want work experience is because it shows that the student can bring: 1) practicality to the environment outside of theories and textbooks and 2) Has fleshed out career goals.

 

With that being said, and I do not mean to sound rude, but if you were pressed to list your work experience for an IR grad school and retail/coffee shop/nanny came up I would strongly recommend such a candidate to get some relevant or international work experience. With your current stats, I would say you have a very decent chance at getting in with one year of international experience, but funding might be a different story unless your GRE is superb.

 

Overall, I would say garner some more work experience. Grad school should not feel like it needs to be rushed and you are very young still. Gaining 2-3 years of work experience will make you a much stronger candidate and show that you have real world experience to bring to the table. I like your idea of volunteering overseas and would also recommend to do Peacecorps or Americorps if you have the commitment. The money sucks but the experience is great and you usually get an application fee waived, you look stronger on your resume and many grad schools have scholarships set aside for Americorps and/or Peacecorps volunteers.

[Guest]

For the first part of your post, it's definitely not 100% rare for candidates to be accepted into a program straight out of undegrad. I am also a candidate who applied with 0 work experience (in my field. I only had retail work like you) and I also lagged on some other aspects beyond that.I also 'would have' had one study abroad program experience, but my parents were paranoid about me going to the country. Oh well. Anyway,the only thing that I honestly had was a high GPA/honors, research, language skills, a well-written statement of purpose+ references. I have my personal reasons for applying straight out of undergrad and will not waste space with that. In short, I definitely wanted to get it out the way at a stage where I don't  have many distractions in life.I also wouldn't have a way to pay for any international travel for work (ie: parent's won't help; not eligible for a personal loan/credit card).Word of advice though, if you're 100% hardcore about a lot of funding, then having a high GRE score is a strong component to that as well (something that was low in my case). You're good in the GPA arena. 

 

To move on from that, having 1-2 years of international work experience can play a role of making you a stronger candidate. Some applications will directly ask if you have international experience then some won't. I don't think that it is necessary to go all out with 3-5 years though...It would be nice, don't get me wrong. But some of us out there might prefer to go to grad school where life circumstances aren't too complex or too busy. Even if you only have one year of international experience (Fletcher's security program wanted nearly 5), then do what the poster above me mentioned-  Ensure that your GREs are superb in order to get funding at least.

 

Some graduate programs also grant opportunities to get more international experience if you choose to apply for Fall 2016. In my current program,  I intend to pursue 2 international-based opportunities in 2 different countries.

 

Give the 'Results search' tab a peak too..it lets you know the consistency of some former applicants in schools that interest you...such as gre scores, being straight from undergrad, etc from any grad school out there.

 

http://www.thegradcafe.com/survey/

Edited June 26, 2015 by Guest

[leon32]

Keep in mind that after you have graduated, you will be competing with a group of people with masters degrees as well as (in many cases) impressive work histories. This would make things much harder for you, and you should consider this aspect as well.