aslabchu
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aslabchu reacted to a post in a topic:
So.... We're moving to Bloomington? Indiana University- Fall 2016
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If I'm understanding properly, you're asking if you should go to the #16 program for free or the #1 program for a decent amount. I suspect I'd go with the latter, but it depends on your existing financial situation.
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Well done. Was everything alright as-is, or did you have to shop around?
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A little off-topic, but I don't really understand why there are so few MPA folks around here. Maybe public admin is just unsexy, I guess.
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That's disappointing. That's an awesome nose.
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DC1020 reacted to a post in a topic:
Is 100K of Debt Not Insane?
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I think it's actually some nonprofit or other, but I stole the idea from a brochure, I believe. The pic stuck with me. I can't find it now, but it's a girl at a Farmer's market with a sign.
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Didn't know that. Oops. Looks like I can't edit now, so I'll just have to wear the badge of shame.
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This forum doesn't seem to respect those rankings very much. There's more of a bias here toward private schools, seemingly motivated by reputation/brand name. For whatever reason, highly-ranked public schools like Syracuse and IU don't get much respect.
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Do we get to meet your dog? If so, sure.
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Looks like you're going to want to get a water filter. http://www.heraldtimesonline.com/news/local/city-water-quality-coordinator-says-bloomington-meets-standards-by-skin/article_d759df4c-ad88-576e-820c-1adf4a328926.html
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I think the best way to handle this is through a PM. Check your inbox.
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Phiner. Determination reacted to a post in a topic:
So.... We're moving to Bloomington? Indiana University- Fall 2016
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My understanding is that for a decent fraction of the group, the Service Corps assignment actually becomes their internship. Which makes some sense, if you think about it. You're losing this worker who's been there for about 8 months, working for free (from your perspective). Losing them over the summer might mess with the good thing you've got going, so it's not an outlandish idea to pay to keep them on for the summer (and the interns don't have to be paid by the higher Service Corps standard, unfortunately, although they definitely get more hours in the summertime). They won't have to re-adjust after having been somewhere else for a couple of months. And after that, they're back to being free labor for another 9 months, But that's not to say that the internship isn't super valuable by itself. And in my case, it may well be that a somewhat lesser Service Corps job will put me in a position to qualify for a more meaningful internship that's relevant to my interests. In particular, I'm trying to transition to a new area completely (I'm a teacher, but want to get into life sciences admin type stuff), so getting a foothold with Service Corps might actually help me qualify for that sort of thing. Provided I don't get one of the sadder ones, like manning a kiosk at the Farmer's Market for 12 hours a week.
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Indiana University Bloomington SPEA 2016
aslabchu replied to aslabchu's topic in Government Affairs Forum
I was a little surprised at how small Bloomington feels. If you live even remotely close to downtown, it truly feels like your entire world is about 4-5 miles across. But then I look at the stats and see Blooming has 70,000 people. I wonder where they're all hiding. -
Well, I went apartment shopping in Bloomington. I gotta tell you guys: BE CAREFUL. There are a lot of shady companies out there. DO NOT get an apartment sight unseen. Management companies will try to tell you that all of the units are the same, so they don't need to show you anything other than promo shots. That's when you should know they're trying to mislead you. Be sure to Google these companies. Check out their reviews. You're likely to find some shady stuff going on. I'm from an area in Michigan with some truly awful economic hardship and I have never seen apartments (or neighborhoods; the entire block was like that!) as run down and gross as the ones I saw last weekend. In general, if they're charging less than $600, they're within 2 miles of campus, and it's not a house, you are in for some serious weirdness. You have to ask yourself: if it's so close and so great, why aren't they charging the market rate? (Answer: it's because it's a hovel.) Anyway, there are some reputable places left. I went with Meadow Park*. It's a little further away from campus than most (about 2 miles from my program's building), but it has an excellent reputation and is generally a nice-looking complex. Site here: http://www.meadowpark-apts.com/ They have another complex a little closer to campus, Fountain Park, but it's not quite as good of a deal. (More expensive for the same size.) http://www.fountainpark-apts.com/. When I talked to the company, they said they had tons of units left. *PS. They're not giving me any money or anything for this plug, but I kinda wish they would.
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The smallest of bumps. Ending up getting a little more funding out of IUB, and that made them my best offer by just a hair. Because I have a relatively weak resume in terms of work experience, SPEA's Service Corps program seemed like a very attractive option. If I were to go to Washington or AU, I would graduate with just a fraction of the work experience (likely just a summer internship, maybe some GA stuff), and I think it would really hurt me on the job market. Plus, I'm not sure AU or UW would have done much for my career goals, as I want to live and work in the Midwest. No DC or NYC for me. And, of course, Bloomington is pretty cheap as far as major college towns go, and that's very appealing to me. But those are all the obvious ones. The little thing that swayed me quite a lot was that SPEA doesn't depend on IU or the graduate college to issue their degrees. My understanding is that the greater administration has very little influence on that. And what that means is that if SPEA says your class should count toward your degree, it counts. How this is useful is that SPEA uses faculty advisors, any of whom can sign off on those kinds of changes to your degree program. So if you've got a career plan in mind that might not benefit from the vanilla MPA experience (and you've got a faculty member on board with this), you can chop up the requirements and make them work for you. I think the only stuff that you can't mess with are the core classes, and there are only 5 of those. So you've got about 10-11 classes of wiggle room.
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Indiana University Bloomington SPEA 2016
aslabchu replied to aslabchu's topic in Government Affairs Forum
What were people's impressions from Experience Day? Did it make or break things?