op1920

The acceptance rate last year for Princeton's MPA program (equivalent to the 2-year MPP at other schools) was 13%. I think there's about a ~70% yield (i.e. of those admitted, the percentage who accept), therefore I think there was a total of about 770 applicants. I think it's worth noting that even though there's a smaller number of applicants to Princeton than to some other schools, the quality of each applicant is probably higher. This is because (1) there's a required 4-page policy memo (an extra hoop to jump through) (2) because it's a less well-known program than say, HKS and (3) people may only apply if they think they have a "good" chance of getting in. I've heard that there are a fair number of people who apply to HKS just because it's Harvard (even though they may not be a good fit for the degree or have the required test scores/experience), so HKS' acceptance rate could in part be a function of its popularity (I'm sure this is the case at many schools, but I wouldn't be surprised if this were more so the case at Harvard) Therefore, comparing one acceptance rate to another may not always reveal the full picture.

You should write about something you already know a lot about and that fits in with the rest of your application (i.e. if you've worked on health care policy for a number of years, you should explore something *specific* within health care policy -- the more specific, the better)

The 160 is across both years (70-80 MPA1s (MPAs in their first year), 70-80 MPA2s (MPAs in their second year.)

The admit rate last year was 13%. Here are the profiles of current students but I'm not sure how much this helps (this is just current students who wrote their own profile and it's pretty open-ended.) http://wws.princeton.edu/admissions/mpa/biographical-profiles-current-mpa-graduate-students

The MPA at Princeton is the equivalent of the MPP at other schools. Also, I'd say the scholarship is more in the realm of $150,000 (they pay full tuition for 2 years, which is about $100,000.) Additionally, they give you a generous stipend for living expenses etc. with no strings attached -- about $25,000--$28,000 per year for two years). Pretty much anyone who gets in gets this (unless you're coming in with a ton of savings or a very high previous salary, though I'm not exactly sure about the specifics on this)