MastersHoping

Try "A Thousand Miles to Freedom: My Escape from North Korea." Talks about a girl's life in North Korea and China and details her escape from North Korea. If you haven't thought much about East Asia or North Korea and things like that, could be a good introduction. If you have, it could be a nice one to add to the collection.

Send me a PM and we can talk about it

IMO, either one is fine if you want to get PhD in econ. Personally, I would go for the German master's. Especially since German universities are free for everyone, and presumably you have to pay something for UofM even if you're in state. Plus, it could be a really worthwhile endeavor from a personal development perspective (after having spent a year abroad!). I am also in a similar boat as you, for a different field. I got a masters before Ph.D, which both helped me get INTO a Ph.D program AND is helping to knock some of the credits out of the way for my Ph.D. The only difference is, I regret doing mine because of the cost and the cost alone. If you go to Germany, there will be no tuition costs for you. Good luck!

Oops, I was thinking of this as a general how many schools to apply to kind of thread, didn't quite realize you were trying to gauge specifically SLP.

I applied to 4 (all very prestigious universities) and got into one. I also had good but not great GRE, and 3.3 ish GPA. Good luck.

Hello, From the sounds of it, looks like I'll be in 3 classes. Although, can an undergrad language class be used to count toward full-time student requirements? Telkanuru, it didn't seem that clear to me in the handbook, although we haven't officially started registering for courses yet so maybe it'll become more clear closer to September.

Hello! Thanks for the response. Ah so I guess it's not unreasonable at all to spread it out over 3 years. Perfect! Thanks. I wonder if I can do just 2 courses a semester for my whole time there.

So I was surprised to find out that PhD students in my program (I am an entering student) are required to take 14 classes (I will get two knocked out because I have a masters). I was wondering, does coursework happen in the first two years only? Or do students sometimes/often take 3 years to finish coursework? The graduate handbook doesn't make it clear. I'd like to take only 2 classes a semester, but that would be impossible if 14 classes must be done in 2 years. I didn't want to ask my grad department yet because 1) I don't want to come off as "lazy" before classes even start and 2) class registration won't be starting until late august/september anyway. I'm just wondering what the general norm is. I'm in Poli Sci btw.

While I personally am a big fan of online courses and personally find them as valuable, if not more valuable sometimes, than in-person courses, there might still be an implicit prejudice against them. So, it might be the case that if you and someone else were virtually identical but the other person took the courses in person, they might be looked upon more favorably. However, having them taken online, especially given your circumstances, is significantly better than nothing. You should feel justifiably proud of yourself for taking the initiative. Good luck.

Does anyone know whether Ph.D programs let you take a leave of absence to pursue things like a Fulbright?

Not necessarily, but it wouldn't hurt. You need to be a native or near native speaker of English with a neutral North American (aka USA and Canada) accent and have a bachelor's degree.

To the OP: I really respect PlanB's opinion, but I am going to have to respectfully disagree with it (wholeheartedly). Just to be clear, the part I disagree with is that your GPA is too low to get into a top program. Columbia may have good placement rate, I don't know anything about that. For most Ph.D programs, they're not that interested in seeing you get close to straight A's, because it's not that meaningful to them. The higher the GPA is, the better, of course, but it's not a make or break type thing. I for example also got a 3.3 GPA in undergrad in a much less difficult major, am currently in an MA program, and am one of only two people to get into a PhD program (and I also have the lowest GPA in my grad program out of the people who are applying to Ph.Ds). What's more important are your research potential, research interests, and match with the department. Even if you do the Columbia program, it's not guaranteed you'd get into a Ph.D program. Instead, you could work in a lab this year or heck just work somewhere that doesn't even have much to do with your Ph.D goals. You can do MOOCs on the side (coursera, edx, futurelearn, MITOpenCourseWare all come to mind) for FREE to increase your skills.

Would you be interested in a job teaching English online? I get around $20 an hour for it.

This doesn't seem too difficult of a predicament to me. Romance languages are easy to learn online. Go check out Duolingo.com for French. Read newspapers in French everyday, go watch some vlogs on YouTube, participate in meetup.com for French meetup groups, etc. Then, after maybe a few months of intensive study and practice, take the DELF test to prove your level. Good luck!

Admitted to Johns Hopkins and accepted my offer! Who else will be going to JHU?? It's already starting to drive me crazy when people say John Hopkins! Haha.

Without doubt, UIUC. I live in the D.C. area and attend a university equally expensive as GW. The debt I have is debilitating. Trust me, it's not worth it. And GW isn't even that good where it's worth going into tens of thousands of dollars of debt for. If you want to work in Education in the future, I do not see any reason why UIUC wouldn't fully prepare you for that, and besides, you might end up working in a slightly different area of education. Just to tell you how much it's not worth it, I wake up every morning around 7:00 AM for work and work several hours, head to classes, then work again at night. I also sign up for paid studies at my universities to earn some extra petty cash. Guess what? 100% of it is going toward my loans, which, because we're graduate students, are unsubsidized and accumulating interest every day, even in school. 100% of the money I earn that doesn't go toward food or cost of living goes to the debt, and I've barely made a scratch in it. In terms of prestige and quality, UIUC is highly well regarded internationally. GW is not quite so well known. I'm not so sure about education in particular though. The biggest plus for both of them is that they're both online. I'm personally a big fan of online education.

As someone who has experience in both Buffalo and Washington (not so much in NYC), my question is to you, how important is the tuition/cost of living/financial aid? If you are by any chance in state for UB, I would seriously suggest going there. I currently attend Georgetown University for a 1.5 year master degree (and I'm about to graduate), I can tell you, it was the worst financial decision I'd ever made in my life. I was accepted at SUNY Binghamton for the same program, and just my cost of living alone in DC could have paid for the entire program. So essentially, although I think Georgetown is a good university and I like it, I sincerely regret coming purely due to the costs. Of course, I know some of my classmates got full fellowships/scholarships, so they lucked out, but me, not so much. There might be some difference in quality of program, but that's more or less subjective, and besides, to me there is no way the quality difference could justify being over 75, 000$ more expensive. If you plan to stay around the Buffalo area, I can also tell you that UB is highly respected in the area. Even if you aren't, UB is a solid name. Besides, neither GW nor NYU are that much more prestigious anyway, and my impression is that UB is very good in computer science. Also, cost of living is extremely affordable in Buffalo. You can split an apartment with someone and your share of the rent might be as low as $400 a month! Whereas in D.C., it's rare to find something less than $1000. Finally, computer science is, from my understanding, one of those fields where the actual hard skills you gain from the program will be much more important than the actual name. So in that sense, I guess it ultimately doesn't really matter too much where you go, so long as you acquire the relevant competences and skills. Overall, if I were you, I'd take Buffalo. Go Bulls!

Would it be possible for you to take classes as a non-matriculated student? That way, you could do like 2 classes a term while maybe working on the side, rock those classes with A's. If you really want a Master's, have you considered online Master's? What about Harvard Extension School? The way you get into Harvard Extension is by taking 3 classes and doing well in them, then applying for admission. No GREs, no Rec letters etc, and they have a master's with concentration in gov't (aka political science). Try some online MOOCs like Coursera, EdX, Futurelearn too.

As a Canadian citizen, I probably would've advised myself to go to a Canadian master's degree program for much cheaper than the expensive private school I go to now, and gone to an American Ph.D with significantly less debt. While my school is good and the program is great too, the costs are just prohibitively high. I also really dislike some of my classmates, one of whom I unfortunately used to live with, so I probably would've advised myself not to have lived with that person.

Congrats to all those who made it! It's my second time applying actually, and I don't think I will be applying again. Would've been cool to have but that's alright

Rejected ETA Korea. That's okay, not that disappointed. I've got other choices. Congrats to all semi-finalists!

Try Coursera: https://www.coursera.org/course/microecon

^ditto on that Quality of sample takes precedence over the topic

Haha yeah I would imagine it is very very different from what we're used to in the states!!! Hmmm, luckily I don't have any of those problems. No allergies, and usually wear glasses over contacts (contacts hurt and dry out my eyes! ) The homestay is probably the best thing about Korea. I've been learning Korean for quite some time now, and I spent the past summer living with a host in Seoul who didn't speak that much English. Really helped me with learning the language Only 2.5~~ more months!

No one knows anything about the visas? :(