vanatrick

Anyone else get into the Keough School at Notre Dame?? Got an offer email today - comes with a full-tuition scholarship and living stipend! Looking to see if anyone else here got in.

I faced the same choice as many of you above and accepted my offer from NPSIA. Obviously it goes without saying that the dilemma between the two programs is a good one to have—either is great preparation for a career in policy. NPSIA does look to be on the decline (at least relative to other programs), but I decided to make my decision in part based on what is true right now—for the time being, NPSIA is still the most highly regarded program in the country, with the better-known faculty, and so I suspect it provides at least slightly better opportunities for scholarly engagement/interaction with leading scholars in the field. GSPIA does seem to place more of a structural focus on professional development with its internship and co-op offerings, though I think I saw a post from last year that stated that 90% of NPSIAns manage to land summer co-ops after the first year (not guaranteed, but still, not the most discouraging statistic either). To be honest what really drew me to GSPIA was the bilingual nature of the program - I spent a very long time learning French and a bilingual program would have been a great way to keep my language skills sharp, so I'll just have to work extra hard at NPSIA not to lose them! You really can't go wrong either way. In the end I think you just have to go with the program that feels right to you, the one that instinctually appears to be a better fit. Something about NPSIA's tradition, Carleton's campus, and the cohesiveness of the program and cohort made it feel right for me.

I would ask Tabbatha but I imagine so. I took my econ courses through Thompson Rivers University and they worked just fine.

My last name starts with C so that's a possibility.

I got an email from the FGPA. If you're still waiting on yours I wouldn't worry about it—the results from last year show that applicants who were all unofficially accepted the same day received funding notifications at different times.

Thanks @lew! I found the funding info on "Statement of Standing" page to be a lot more clear and comprehensible than on the "Awards and Funding" page, just FYI!

My formal offer for NPSIA just came in—$14k in funding! I will probably not be turning this down

I was accepted to the MIA but without funding. I probably won't be able to justify paying all of that $ when schools in Canada are offering me quite a bit of funding...

Just got into NPSIA as well! I hope word on funding comes in soon!

I'm having the same problem. This says that there should be a "view letter" option, but I'm not seeing it anywhere.

I'm still on "Recommended for Assessment" as well.

I'm turning down Munk. GSPIA is giving me until the 25th to respond, so hopefully I'll hear back beforehand!

That's how I kind of see it too. NPSIA and, to a somewhat lesser extent, GSPIA are great preparatory programs for careers with the federal government: a ton of their students get government internships, the people students network with are mostly government-affiliated, etc. That almost comes with the terrain—if you're in a professional program in Ottawa it will just naturally be easier to pursue a career within a federal agency. But that strong link between the Ottawa-based programs and the government is also its main limitation. A Munk professor told me that a student in NPSIA or GSPIA might find themselves having to take a federal job even if they would prefer working in the private or nonprofit sectors, that there's a risk of getting "trapped." So in the end it really does come down to what you want to do after graduation. If you're fine with working for the federal government (as I'd be open to doing, even if it's not necessarily my first choice), then turning down a great offer from NPSIA or GSPIA and paying Munk's astronomical tuition fees just doesn't seem like it would be worth it. But if you want to expand your options beyond government then going to Munk might be a worthwhile investment.

I'm sure that a U of T graduate degree would be helpful if you're searching for jobs internationally, but a place like, say, GSPIA opens the door to great Canada-based careers: GSPIA has a website with a list of alumni, most of whom seem to be in interesting governmental positions (and there's a few too who are based abroad). Since grads of the less internationally recognized schools seem to enjoy quite a bit of professional success, I'm not sure that the name "U of T" alone is enough to justify that high of a price tag unless one specifically wants to pursue a career in a large intergovernmental organization or international NGO.

Yeah that's exactly it. Munk's tuition is $20k a year. Two years of tuition fees plus two years of living expenses in Toronto.... I would really love to go but it's not gonna happen haha.