Ariel Chiang

GWU Elliott offers me 7000 per semester, SAIS, nothing. I'm in agony

I'm facing the same dilemma too. But mine is between SAIS and Elliot. SAIS also does not provide me an funding (tho they did say for the second year student, they are looking at funding 50 to 60% of graduate), while Elliot offers me 7 grand per semester. My agony is that I'm a foreign student who are hoping to get a job in DC for conflict management field, and a name like SAIS and Johns Hopkins are tooooooooo shining. I wrote to my adviser. And below is what he replied, it may help you too: "Consider this, if cost and reputation were the only two factor it would be a 1:1 tie (JHU wins on reputation while GWU wins on cost). Are there other factors that you aren't considering in this equation? In general, I like to consider the following: Access to local markets. Which school has greater access through projects, internships, and networking in the local market? Post Graduation Employment within your field - are these numbers available? Support for international students. Which school possesses faculty, academic focus, or regional expertise the greater aligns with your areas of interest. What is the size of classes and professor-student ratio (the smaller the ratio the better). Now, if after all these factors you still come to a tie, my get feeling would be to go with GWU, just because prestige and reputation means less and less these days. What really matters is access to the labor market, practical experience, and one's network. You can get all of that and more in any school in the D.C. region." Good luck and maybe we will see each other in DC.