shakazulu

that's some ridiculous bullshit. you worked your ass off and jumped through a lot of insane hoops. good luck, i hope it works out for you.

Decisions are out. I got it. Dear Mr. ****, Congratulations! This email serves as unofficial notification that you have been selected to receive a 2013 National Security Education Program (NSEP) David L. Boren Fellowship. We are mailing you an award packet, which will include a Notice of Award. In order to accept your award, you must fax or email IIE a signed copy of the Notice of Award by Tuesday, May 7, 2013 or within three days of receipt of the packet. If you do not receive the packet by May 6, please let us know. A checklist of all required materials, as well as downloadable forms and deadlines can be found athttp://borenawards.org/boren_fellowship/awardee_checklist.html. Congratulations once again on your successful application! We look forward to working with you this year. Sincerely, Christopher Powers I sincerely wish the best of luck to all of you!

alright, im getting off this forum for the rest of the week. it's not conducive to being productive. best of luck to everyone and all the best!

err that's what it says on the google doc. dunno what to tell you then. i know they take the relevance of your proposed study and language to national security into consideration. that said, it's probably easier to make a case for going abroad to study kinyarawanda (spoken in a huge conflict zone, has continuing relevance in resource wars in eastern congo, etc.) than doing the same to learn italian, swiss german, or swedish. there's just no demand for those languages in the natsec community. although all languages have utility in different contexts, it depends on the person, his or her personal goals, and track record of interest in the region where they propose to study. your guess is as good as mine when it comes to the selection process, but that is the dynamic as i understand it. in the end, it comes down to the individual and how he or she intends to use their linguistic skills. if i wanted to study persian, a hugely relevant language to national security, to become a specialist in medieval islamic poetry, i would most likely get shot down in a heartbeat.

sure, but at the same time spanish/south america are accessible for americans. if you really wanna go down there or learn spanish, you can do it with or without the boren. if that is your goal, a boren award would be awesome, but not mandatory. imagine if you wanted to study kinyarawanda in rwanda or turkmen in turkmenistan... all of a sudden the award is a lot more important.

dude i know the process is stressful and the uncertainty sucks, but rest assured that you WILL get an acceptance/alternate/rejection in the next week. you will only know then. no amount of hypothesis or looking at the google doc will change that. everyone here is in the same boat. just keep your chin up, take a deep breath, and try to take your mind off it.

i'm pretty sure tajikistan was the most applied-to country. tajikistan zinda bad!

I'm in the security studies program and i'm looking to work on my Farsi in Tajikistan.

hey what program are you in at Gtown and what is your Boren proposal?

just announced on the FB page that it's gonna be in april... it's gonna be a long, long, long two weeks

well let's hope that didn't burn me.

i sincerely hope someone didn't call in when they saw my post. no one told me anything, i just used my amazing deductive analytical powers to come to my groundbreaking conclusion.

i wonder if they posted that in response to anything... did anyone call in there and ask yesterday or today?

does it matter? it's not like anyone can influence their decisions.

for those in the DC area - if we get acceptance letters, let's go out for a no holds barred happy hour. just a thought.

thank you everyone! i would also like to believe that it's an unofficial official acceptance (which is what i thought at the time), but i got it before the infamous "dates" email we received. so... who knows.

where did you get that? why would they expend resources, time, and personnel on preparing date confirmation emails for people they're going to reject. that was the third in a series of emails i received from them during march regarding my program... i find it hard to believe that they would make any such effort on an application if it weren't a serious contender. either way, it would seem that busget emails aren't coming out for whatever reason... at this point i am sure that regional committees have made their selections and nominated the applications they liked best. no one will be getting a budget email.

In the absence of hard data or any correlation with previous years, this is all speculation. It seems clear that thos budgets won't come out (if they do in the next week that's a different thing). My gut tells me we'll only know once final decisions come out.

ive had three communications with the boren personnel in the last few weeks... one was a clarification about budget stuff, another concerned extending my time abroad for a week, and another was the date email a lot of people seemed to have received. im a bit concerned about the lack of the notorious budget emails, but i take it all together as a good sign. hang in there everyone. the wait is painful but we'll make it.

i think it's safe to say we aren't getting budget emails at this point

ok i did some research. i wouldn't accept anything less than a well paid for orientation in addition to my substantial, prestigious government grant either. we will be paid $40/hr and provided with all-included luxury accomodations at the mandarin oriental hotel in washington d.c. pretty chic huh? i'm stoked. hope that answered your question!

Kbardat thats very first world/good problem to have. I wouldnt worry about it.

wait what budget emails????

lots of africa junkies on this site. Granted i've never been, but what draws you guy to it so much?

my start date is in late august and i got a date confirmation email