coaks

Got the same thing but I assumed that this would be covered by the internship between years 1 & 2. Is that 240 hours above and beyond? Like, for example, during the school year? I'm sure a lot of people will have questions about it at the admitted students thing on Fri. April 9, so I'll be sure to listen up when they address it.

Yep, IBR and PSLF are active now. The 2014 terms (which admittedly I still don't fully understand due to conflicting info; I apologize if I've confused anyone else unnecessarily) only refer to (I believe) slight improvements to the standards used in those programs.

Haha, I'm glad someone brought some humor to this thread finally. Just to show you all what I was looking at when I mentioned the 2014 thing, here's a post from the House Education & Labor committee on it: http://edlabor.house.gov/blog/2010/03/student-loan-reform-whats-in-i.shtml#more I hope you're right (though yeah, 20 years isn't all that big a deal compared to 25) but I fear the July 2010 situation might just be when the direct lending thing starts for everyone, not the other stuff. Also gazelle, this is something I was glancing at earlier today about IBR. http://www.ibrinfo.org/what.vp.html There's a chart that shows the different percentages on there for 2009. Granted, it's incomplete, doesn't list the $80K example you mentioned and I haven't verified any info. But the graphics are pretty and it claims to be nonprofit, so I assume it's either kosher or a very malicious bank with a supersecret plan to scheme our money. Just wanted to share.

Good points, especially with IBR (although I would definitely lean on IBR if I had steady work for a public organization and was confident in being able to make good on loan forgiveness). Thankfully inflation and your accelerated career progression will work in your favor to help cover a lot (and for some, all) of the $53K in interest. Of course, a slew of other life events like marriages, children, extended unemployment, severe injury to yourself or a family member would work against you.

Not to mention it looks like both the new standard IBR and 20 year forgiveness provisions might only apply to new borrowers in 2014 and beyond. I hope I am misunderstanding who is included.

I think $800/month would be very tough but doable at first. But you'd probably qualify for income-based repayment, in which case you could lower your payments to almost half that, if you so chose to extend your term and trade-off principle repayment for lifestyle and job selection. I presume people that work in IR get raises and promotions, though, which would soon ease your burden.

What salaries do they pay in IR?

At 6.8% fixed interest rate, the difference to you would be approximately $350/month for 10 years. If the $100K option also has a better career services department, you could potentially pay for that with post-grad salary gains.

And to add to the original discussion, the MPP/MBA, for me, as an early career applicant with a non-quantitative background and as a private to public/non-profit career switcher, allows me to hedge my career goals (public or non-profit management/consulting) against future career uncertainty. The MPP, while doing wonders for my professional development and analytical expertise, appears as if it could be worth pennies on the dollar in the private world, at least when compared to the MBA.

stilesg57, good luck! Are you looking at Fuqua for next year's application season? Or did you throw in an R3 app this year? (Or other business schools, down the line, perhaps?)

Haha, what grad affairs program are you attending? I'll cross it off my list. Valid point, though, but one I hope few adhere to. I'd rather compete for funding with ten times the applicants and lose knowing the most-deserving candidates won then "earn" scholarship money because I was the only one to apply.

<br /><br /><br /> Yep. After my fourth or fifth call, I finally got in touch with the admissions team. My decision had been rendered the week before but had mistakenly not been sent -- or sent to the wrong e-mail address, I don't know. Happily dinged so I won't have to rely on the Harris team for anything in the future. Good luck to you though if Harris is still where you want to go. The admissions team said, with a sigh, that there were still applications before committee, believe it or not.

Program Applied To: MPA and MPP with dual applications to the MBA program at each school (with one exception, Goldman doesn't offer a dual degree program with Haas) Schools Admitted To: UMich Ford (MPP), Carnegie Mellon Heinz (MSPPM), NYU Wagner (MPA), Pepperdine SPP (MPP) Schools Rejected From: UC Berkeley GSPP (MPP), UChicago Harris (MPP) Waitlisted: Duke Sanford (MPP) Undergraduate Institution: Top 3 Public Undergraduate GPA: 2.9 Undergraduate Major: English GRE Quant Score: 790 GRE Verbal Score: 650 GRE AW Score: 5.5 Years Out of Undergrad: 3 at matriculation Years of Work Experience: 3 at matriculation Describe Relevant Work Experience: Demographic, cost/benefit analysis, project management and internal consulting for two for-profit companies. So relevant in role, not company function. Strength of SOP: I think it was very solid, though I didn't get a start until November, after I finished my GMAT prep. I started on the Goldman application which was good, since it was the longest by far and requires you draw from so many aspects of your history in each statement. That along with the business school prompts (which are more focused and varied) helped me refine the basic outline I had for the Goldman application, cut the fluff and add some important goals. Strength of LORs: I worked hard for the companies that hired me so I had great recs. I had one academic LOR from a continuing ed professor, one past supervisor and one current supervisor. I saw two of the three after they were submitted and they were fantastic. I wouldn't have been able to write them better myself. My refs really took care of me. Other: Pepperdine, Heinz and Wagner added funding at 33%, 20% and 5% COA, respectively.

Yeah, my original post that I deleted was very much along those lines. I would encourage you to scrutinize the calculations of "needed" salary on that debt pay-back calculator. Actually calculate what you expect to make, find the amount of money you will be bringing home every month after taxes, calculate your monthly payment on a 10 year and 30 year alternate timeframe. When you do this, you should see the numbers/assumptions for what you "need" are simply inflated. I am looking at over $100K in debt after my MPP and I'm not concerned about being able to repay in the 10 year timeframe or having my quality of life/ability to save for retirement/home-ownership affected.

No, I'm totally with you. I feel the exact same way about Harris right now. (I still haven't heard back from Harris, despite having everything there by the deadline). There's no way I can imagine matriculating at a school this disorganized / uninterested in their future student body. If this is how they deal with applications, I can't imagine how they deal with the competing internship and job-placement needs of a 250+ person student body. It's disheartening to see Wagner doing the same thing to you.

For me, I think the overwhelming majority of the nuts-and-bolts of any specific position in an organization (public/non-gov/non-profit/private) is learned on the job. The biggest thing you're not going to learn on the job is the statistical and economic theory behind the tools that you use or the assumptions that you have to make about demand, supply, observed results, forecasted results and consumer behavior. Also, trying to switch into these kinds of organizations after starting a career in the private sector, having at least two years experience applying the same principles I use at my current job to issues of public concern -- and getting the university stamp of approval for doing so -- will definitely make it easier to get a foot in the door at a lot more places. Those are my reasons at least. Don't know about everyone else.

Last Friday, the 19th, I got an e-mail about my acceptance and I had everything (scores, recs -- I empathize with the person that got screwed over by their recommender; that's a terrible thing to do to an applicant and Wagner's at least partially shame-worthy for not considering you sooner) to the school prior to submitting my app at a minute before the Jan 7th deadline.

In my Wagner acceptance letter, they offered me a teeny tiny amount of funding. It won't be a factor in my decision. I hope others have gotten and will eventually get much more.

Yep, same here. I really do think a lot of people miss the importance of the breadth of your marketability. Once you get past a certain point in your career, your ability to qualify for positions in other industries/organizations that are more than a couple of rungs up the ladder is greatly diminished. With an all-purpose degree like an MPP or MPA (or MBA), you can often appear more attractive than the in-house option that doesn't have that same university stamp of approval but, let's be honest, could probably do the job better than you can at first. (You being anyone of us applying for any random mid-level position). However, organizations are pre-disposed to preferring the individual with the certification. I don't think that preference is all that controversial and I don't see it changing appreciably in the future.

End of the week, huh? So if we don't get an e-mail by the end of day, we can assume Harris missed another self-imposed deadline with no communication or explanation?

And to translate that into salary terms: http://www.fedjobs.com/pay/pay.html

How many of us that submitted and postmarked materials prior to the January 3rd deadline are still in limbo regarding Harris?

Great points and I too am enjoying this discussion because it's good to know others are dealing with the same issues and approaching them in similar ways (as opposed to the many threads I've seen with knee-jerk reactions one way or the other -- you should see the MBA message boards.) I couldn't help but throw out one quick question, tgoldring. Why isn't Carnegie Mellon on the top of your list if your S.O.'s at Pitt? It seems like CMU has a quantitative focus to rival Ford, a wider range of course offerings from term to term (at least that was what I thought when I reviewed the curricula recently), and you and your partner could save money in Pittsburgh if you lived together (is that an option for you)? I personally am leaning toward Ford over CMU + $ because I noticed a difference in some post-graduate work opportunities (Ford's career office looked like it was really helping students land some good positions whereas I was unsure of whether CMU's was working as hard), because the students I've seen at Ford impressed me a little more, because Ann Arbor's amazing -- but most of all because it's a quick train ride away from my S.O. in Chicago. I mean I wouldn't push one way or another and I myself would probably choose Ford over Heinz but just curious if you preferred Michigan for the same reasons or for others.

Yeah, any school becomes an extremely tough choice without funding. GSI spots are definitely competitive. Perhaps you'd have a better shot at getting a GSI position for a course in your undergraduate area of expertise, at least until you've completed some of the MPP programs. Also, the broad undergrad feeder courses, like the Intros to Micro and the Undergrad Writing Requirements are going to need the most GSI anyways. I would imagine, especially for those very basic courses (like the UG writing requirement) many students are taking for their cores, they'd be open to pulling from a variety of backgrounds. Still, there are many places to work off-campus in Ann Arbor, if everything else falls through. Ford for me should end up being $40K more expensive than my best offer but I'm definitely leaning towards making that investment.

Like magic, just got an e-mail from Ford. No funding for me. But extremely helpful links in terms of signing up to be a GSI and additional sources of income. Very happy overall with the resources provided, even if there was no actual money to be had.