Gov2School

Not necessarily, Spring Break doesn't impact the Admission offices (people who work in administrative jobs at universities don't go on spring break), but it may be next week anyway. For what it's worth, the MSFS program says "By April 1", which seems crazy late (by April 1 I plan to have a good sense of my options and already have booked my admitted students weekend trips).

Nope. On the HKS admissions blog on Monday they said they're finalizing decisions and putting everything into their system, so hopefully that means they're close. No idea how long it takes them to do that and then do the checks they have to do. I appreciate them being thorough (you hear about people being told they're in, and then get notices later saying they're actually on the wait list), but I hope they hurry!

If you read back one page on this thread, you can see that the one person who is listed on the Results Search page is in the PEPM program. The PEPM participants heard earlier this week about their program, but no info on the regular MPA or MIA program has been released yet. Given how late SIPA's deadline is, it's not surprising that their notifications would come in a little later.

Well, read the fine print carefully, but it should be pretty easy to figure out what a school's policy is on refunds because of withdrawals. They should have clearly stated deadlines and guidelines about when you have to pay and what the refund policy is. You can also always ask the office: "What happens if I accept this offer and then I have to withdraw at some point before I can matriculate?" It's not a crazy question, things happen (parents get sick, you get sick, you suddenly go broke, whatever). Let's assume that anyone considering this year is not the first person in this situation, so school's will have policies to protect both themselves and the student from bad decisions.

Yeah, I'm also thinking Friday is the day. I was hoping by now we'd have heard from both Princeton and HKS, but I guess they're both taking their time.

You should keep in mind that, assuming you can afford it, you could always put down a deposit at the school you've been accepted to, and remain on the waitlist for the other school. You forfeit your deposit of course if you withdraw after the deadline (and I have no idea how big the deposits are), but it's one way to have your cake and eat it too.

"All that was once old is now new again," as they say. I think that's just further to my point, if you try to learn a language based on what's trending in international affairs, it's not really worth it. People who studied Russian in the 80s and 90s thinking it would be the hot language probably gave up on it by now and wish they had kept it up. But people who are true Russia experts, who devote time to learning not just the language but the nuances of US-Russian relations, are still going to be in demand now, more so than ever because their years of study and practice give them unique perspective. And on top of that, they speak the language. I just think it's a more satisfying approach, because even if your language goes "out of vogue," and they do, you'll still be working in a field or related to a region that interests you.

Three things: 1) I think it's a little pointless to try to approach this from the perspective of "which language will be the most in demand," simply because we can't really know, with any certainty, the future path of global affairs. I can't tell you how many people I know in the government who speak fluent Russian or spent years studying Russian so they could fight the Cold War, only to find that the 90s and 00s were more about the Middle East and Asia. Or people who studied Japanese in the 90s, but now wish they knew Chinese. And while many people want to study Arabic, few people realize that the State Department has many times more Arabic speakers than Hebrew speakers. It's not that Russia is unimportant, or Japan, or any other nation, but just that if you're trying to pick a language based on what you think will be most "in demand" that's not always the best strategy. It's a lot better to pick something related to your particular regional or subject interest. Language skills are great, but subject matter expertise is better and much harder to come by. 2) A lot of people are afraid of the Arabic script, and think it's really hard to learn, but in reality, it's the easiest part of learning Arabic, and I'm sure it's the same for Farsi, since it's the same letters. You already read and write English, so your brain understands how to match up letters and sounds, you just learn how to match different letters with the same sounds. It's extremely easy, only takes a few weeks. I took Arabic years ago, and while I can't remember what most of the words mean anymore, I can still read and pronounce Arabic script. 3) Unless you're a very very disciplined person who has successfully taught themselves a language in the past, it's going to be hard to learn either language with just a tutor and a program (unless your tutor is a language instructor). Rosetta Stone works well, but you have to be extremely disciplined about doing it every day for several hours. Most people are for the first week, and then gradually get lazier, so they don't benefit from it. It would be a lot better to enroll in a formal class, at least for two semesters until you get the fundamentals.

Yeah, I worked with many WWS grads and I got to visit and have some meetings while I was there, all of which were very useful to me, and maybe will help a bit. What field are you interested in? I'm applying for Field IV, but I've heard that it's very competitive as International Relations has become more popular overall with MPAs/MPPs.

Great! Earlier than I expected.

It's an irony that the places closest to universities in DC are some of the most expensive places to live (i.e. Georgetown and the West End around GW), and also not really the best places to live for graduate students. Georgetown doesn't offer much in the area of lower-cost restaurants or upper-20s nightlife, and the West End has the same problem. So don't be afraid to look farther afield. DC is not a large place, you can get point to point in most places within 30 minutes if you know how to travel. And, as I think someone else mentioned, don't be chained to metro stations. DC's buses are pretty easy to navigate (especially if you get the NextBus iPhone app). If you're considering a place, go to the WMATA website and enter it and your university into the trip planner to get a sense of your commute (make sure to select Bus OR Metro as your trip planner option). In terms of safety, I wouldn't give too much credence to people who say "X neighborhood is dangerous/sketchy", they tend to be people who don't really live there. DC overall is a pretty safe city, despite it's reputation, and as neighborhoods gentrify, it's not a monolithic thing. You might love one block and dislike the next, but you have to visit each individually to really know. The Columbia Heights/Mt Pleasant/U Street/14th Street area is a fun part of town to live in, very hipster, and you can still find some good bargains in areas of Mt Pleasant and Columbia Heights. U Street/14th Street is getting pretty expensive and Dupont and Logan Circle are two of the most expensive parts of town, but if you share a 1 bedroom you can sometimes find affordability (In DC, cheap is defined as $1000 per month per person or less). Adams Morgan is also quite nice though also pretty expensive. Petworth, Bloomingdale, and Ledroit Park are also good neighborhoods with more to offer all the time. A little less established than U Street/14th Street, so you can find some good bargains and since they're not as dense you may be able to find a place with off street parking (ideal if you plan to bring a car). Capital Hill is lovely, maybe not as "hip" as other neighborhoods, but very beautiful, great parks, good restaurants, access to metro and bus public transportation. It's easy to get to U Street or Dupont from the Hill by bus, plus the H street area is a great up and coming hip neighborhood. And rents on the Hill seem to be slightly cheaper than in other parts of town. If the idea of living in a large, new apartment condo building appeals (as in you want a door person/secured entry/in house gym etc), check out Navy Yard or Waterfront. Navy Yard is all high rise buildings now, most of them are pretty expensive but also pretty nice. They have roofdecks and some of them have rooftop pools. The problem with the big new buildings is that rents tend to go up year after year and there can be a lot of hidden fees (including moving fees, fees to pay your rent, amenity fees, etc). I don't spend that much time in the "red line" areas (Glover Park, Friendship Heights, NOMA, Rhode Island Ave, etc.), but there are good places there as well. And if you want to check out the Virginia suburbs, Georgetown runs a shuttle bus from the Roslyn metro station to campus (Roslyn is ironically closer to Georgetown than the Foggy Bottom stop in DC). You could also live in the Maryland suburbs like Takoma Park or Silver Spring and take the Red Line to Dupont and catch the Georgetown shuttle from there. Keep in mind though, the Red Line is notoriously the least reliable of all the metro lines (it's the oldest and can be problematic). Again, just check out your commute and try to decide how much time you want to spend getting places. I'd strongly recommend looking for a place where you can commute by public transportation. Both parking and traffic in DC are terrible. I've lived here for years and never owned a car, I mostly use metro, bus, Car2Go, or Uber to get around. One tip: when you visit apartments, ask where people do their grocery shopping. Finding a good grocery store in DC can be a challenge, and any place that's close to a new or newly renovated grocery will be a bonus.

Thanks for the emotional support. It's definitely a crapshoot for everybody, one of my co-workers (who went to HKS) said that no one he knew got accepted his year. We'll just have to wait and see. Maybe tomorrow!

Is it more cultural fit personally or concern about proximity to DC? For proximity to DC, these schools are really about equal. UVA is slightly closer, but it doesn't give you much advantage in terms of prospects. In fact, the way traffic is in this area, it might be faster to take the train between DC and Raleigh than to drive from DC to Charlottesville during rush hour. UVA is too far away from DC for you to do a term time internship, which is the real great advantage of DC schools. Though at UVA, you'd only be an hour from Richmond, so you could potentially do a part time internship at the state capitol. UVA and UNC are both really good schools and well respected programs. In terms of networking, if you're DC focused, see if either school offers financial support to students doing summer internships, find out what kind of term time trips to DC they offer, check out their list of term time events to see what kind of conferences and speakers they attract. Do a Linkedin search to see what kinds of jobs recent grads are holding. If you visit, check out their career services and see what each can offer. You really can't go wrong with either.

I wonder if that's a mistake and they meant the PEPM Master's program. I know from other threads that the SIPA PEPM decisions did go out on 3/14. The Grad Cafe results page may just not allow you to be that specific when you say what program you get in to.

*sigh* One day down, four to go. I know realistically we probably won't hear until Wednesday at the earliest (last year they heard on Friday morning), and that even more realistically, I won't be accepted (really really strong, relevant public service work record, strong GPA from high ranked school, but only a 153 on my Q GRE), but I can't help being nervous until we know for sure.

If past year results are any guide (checking the results search page), SIPA won't send out replies until next week (week of the 17th). Probably because their deadline is so late, it was February 5th for people who didn't want to be considered for fellowships.

I'm confused about why you would even want to go for a second master's degree at this point. If you're doing it just so you can get a big name school on your resume, it seems like a waste of time and money. For DC hiring, people like to see the MA, and the network can help you, but mostly they want to see people with job experience, not classroom experience, people who they know can do the job that's asked of them because they've been able to do it before. If you have so much money saved up and no school debt, maybe think about volunteering on a campaign. That's a great way to quickly build a professional political network that could translate into a job or better connections in DC and it costs nothing but time and effort. You could also use your savings to support you while you look for nonprofit or think tank jobs in DC. Since you don't have debt, you're in a better position than most to go after those jobs, which do not pay super well, especially at first. Keep in mind too that it's not just about DC, state, local, and city governments need the talents of hardworking MPAs as well, and if you want to go the campaign route there's campaigns going on all over the place right now (Governor, mayor, state house and senate, etc etc etc). So if you're concerned about being able to make the leap into an unknown market, maybe see about putting your skills to work in an area where you already have a professional network. Or talk to the nonprofit you work for about contacts and possibilities in the city you most want to move to.

I did a quick Grad Cafe results search for SIPA and it seems like in past years their decisions come out closer to March 20/21, so we probably still have another week or more to go before we start hearing back, which makes sense because I think they had the latest deadline (I applied to the MIA program). I'm hoping to hear from Fletcher by next week, around the same time as HKS and WWS should be releasing their decisions. I didn't apply to SAIS, so I don't know have a sense of when they're likely to say anything, but you should search the Results Search page for SAIS and see when people heard back last year and the year before. That should give you a pretty good window into when you're likely to hear.

For the MA programs I applied to with deadlines in December or first week of January (most of them), I'm expecting to hear back next week sometime. For the ones that were in later in January, I think I'm more likely to hear the week of March 17th. One way to gauge when you're likely to get a reply is to search The Grad Cafe results search page for your specific school/program and see when people have heard back in prior years. It can't tell you 100% when you should hear, but with most schools, there's usually a consistent window, unless admission is rolling. Another good resource is reading the Admissions blogs for the programs you're applying to (if they have admissions blogs), though for most of mine they're just saying "March" or "mid-March" for now. But many are posting interesting articles about the review process or what the various admissions categories mean. I think Harvard Kennedy School has the best admissions blog among MPP programs, and their blog is full of useful info. We're definitely getting close now for Master's announcements, which is good because I'm chewing on the furniture out of nervousness.

It also seems that Master's programs have a fixed deadline for notifying applicants, whereas with Phd programs, they notify people on a more rolling basis. I know the Harvard Health Policy PhD for example, notifies accepted students weeks or even months before they notify rejected students. On the other hand, most of the Master's programs I know operate more like undergraduate notification systems, where they release rejections and acceptances on or about the same day. I wouldn't assume it's a no until you hear about it directly.

The truth is that just with an MPP, you're unlikely to make "serious money." You can make a decent salary, and if you use your degree to go into a high-paying field like international finance or get a joint degree, you might end up becoming a high earner. But most of the people participating in these programs want to work for the government or in the nonprofit world, where salaries are smaller. There are sometimes student loan assistance programs to help with that problem, like if you agree to work for the federal government for X years they'll pay back your loans (I know Harvard has something like this for law students). But you might also just end up paying back student loans over a very long period of time. It's not the kind of thing where you spend a lot in school and then come out and start making six figures right away and pay it all back quickly. That's called business school or corporate law. That's why you apply to several schools and then weigh the pros and cons of each offer. You might get a full scholarship to HKS, but you might not. It might make sense to apply to a few Canadian programs, and also some American programs at other, less expensive universities or universities where you'll get more financial aid. It's also why it's really important to really think carefully about why you're getting the degree and what specific purpose it will serve for you in your chosen career. It's definitely a lot of money, but if you've really thought it through, then it's an investment in your career and your future. If you haven't really thought it through, it could just as easily end up being a waste.

WWS says on their website that decisions will be sent by March 15. But looking at The Grad Cafe's Results Search page for WWS, where you can see results from the past few years with people's stats (tab in the top bar, next to chat), it looks like the last few years people got their results earlier in the week, especially if they were accepted, instead of getting them on Friday. So I think it's reasonable to think it could be anytime the week of the 10th, but if the trends from the last few years hold up, it will be before the 15th. I could be wrong, but that's what the data suggests.

Only one more week to go before we're in decision week! I hope everyone is hanging in there. From the results search page, it seems like the acceptances go out a little earlier than the rejections. Keeping my fingers crossed, I think I'm a competitive applicant (major weakness being not a lot of quant classes in undergrad & GRE quant scores slightly below average; major advantages being strong work history, good reccs, and I think my policy memo and SOP were well done), but with Princeton you just never really know. Good luck to everyone.

What they mean is "public sector, not limited to government". So the NGO sector is generally considered to be part of the public sector, as are non-profits, the World Bank, NATO, the UN, etc. Probably working for a charity or serving in the military could also count. Basically, if you can make the case that what you were doing was primarily for public service rather than generating profits, you could probably count it.

I agree that the criteria of "overcoming adversity" seems a little bit fuzzy, it seems to be more about your overall leadership potential for Dubin.