GradSchoolGrad

The key thing is this: 1. At Heinz, you'll have more robust opportunities (although not guaranteed) to get very intense on the technical side of things. Also, if you look at the career diversity in terms of career outcomes - a lot more things outside of DC. 2. McCourt MS-DSPP - you'll have lots of experiential learning opportunities with live data, but because Georgetown doesn't have a robust CompSci program, so you won't really be integrate your data skills into the most cutting edge for data science, or go deep beyond the class offerings. If you want to get super technical, this is not the place to do it. If you want a cookie cutter federal consulting / federal service career in DC.- MS-DSPP makes sense. However, if you want to be focused on policy innovation or things outside of Federal government, MS-DSPP doesn't make sense. McCourt Notes Culture: Dr. Bailey runs MS-DSPP, and everyone loves him and he has done a terrific job building a program from nothing + makes himself super available to students. However, at the end of the day, it is part of the McCourt Program. The program underinvested in community and career support.

Generally speaking it is renewable, but they don't want to make promises because a not published (but always privately discussed) group of students do actually lose scholarship for going below 3.0 GPA (which is easier to do than you can imagine) or honor violations (which is actually more common than you would expect). Hypothetically, it also frees the University from committing to you on your 2nd year at the discretion of McCourt - granted I have never heard of that happening before.

So MIDP is managed by Dr. Wiebe, and it is all about appealing to his sense of how much value you add vs. his pool of money. Historically, I have seen that a portion of funds dedicated to ensuring International students with unique experiences can matriculate to his program.

So that is all true, but you need to know the nuances behind it. The key word is "apply for GA/RA" roles. You have to understand that you are not other competing with other McCourt students for those roles, but undergrads, grad students of other programs, and recent alumni who wanted some extra cash. So bottom line, is that you have to be uniquely competitive for them. I had 8 years work experience in logistics, but I could not get an RA role to save my life because those were mostly either coding based and I didn't go in knowing code. Also, the pay varies a bit, but when I was there it ranged from 12 to low 20ish dollars an hour (pre-tax) in DC. I did manage to get a GA role only because I was previously published in my field and was paid a lovely $16 an hour. A better way to approach it is to work part time externally --> you can make more money and better pad your resume. Summer RA/GA roles are less competitive, and I knew 2 people who started as early as the summer. I also want to highlight that 1st semester is the hardest semester (unless you are a quant wizard), and having to work part-time is insanely stressful and tiring. If you do want to work part-time, it is best to do it 2nd semester onward.

It’s one of those no such thing as super rude types. You just got to be direct about that you want to renegotiate and XYX things that highlight you are a value add.

Admittance rates are only part of the story. Every school will have diminished admittance rates this year. The other side is the quality of people they can bring in. When this much money is thrown around, that means they are either redirecting money to scholarships (which again, they shouldn’t have to) or they are getting desperate for quality bodies. That being said, EP normally start lower on the scholarship side as I have previously mentioned

wow 27K (without negotiating) per year is a bad sign that they are truly desperate for bodies. Which is compounded by how this is high application year for grad schools. They used to have their highest pre negotiation (non-specialized scholarship - like McCourt scholar) at $20K.

I had two friends go to LBJ - one stayed in Texas (policy innovation girl) and the other swung back to Federal Consulting in DC. You are right, in DC, LBJ doesn't have as much brand recognition as Georgetown, BUT it is still a highly respected brand nonetheless. However, no one knows what McCourt is... just Georgetown There is a McCourt forum that should answer most of your questions. I am also happy to answer anything else.

Not taking the GREs will only hurt you if you have no quant grades or less than stellar grades in general. GREs are meant to show your forward trajectory (these days in admissions anyway) or a confirmation of academic capability. However, if your grades and professional activities justify you with no academic/achievement oriented holes, you should be fine.

You can see my comments about Georgetown (McCourt MPP as well). I am brutally honest about its shortcomings.

I strongly recommend you all stay away from SPA (for graduate students...) as a Policy school period, unless you have no other options or have extensive amounts of funding. I mean, obviously, you should do your own due diligence and base your life choices off of more than some guy on a forum. However, this is the advice I told my family members because: ... Although American has been massively pumping money into SPA with lots of fancy new infrastructure and marketing, that has not translated to quality of a program., My take: a. Low Peer Quality: I have done competitions and conferences at SPA and with/against SPA students - some of the most unimpressive cohort among the policy students I have encountered. The only exceptions are those who have 10+ years work experience who went to SPA because they had great funding. I witnessed classes with American SPA students, the class participation was often below undergrad level mind numbing. Simple questions, of why can't I do this research without data were asked b. Lower Calibre Instructors: The academic quality was difficult for me to stomach - I was shocked that one of my friends (a PhD candidate), was teaching a graduate level SPA class (which had MPPs and MPAs) at American. Yes, the person is my friend, but taking graduate school classes from someone with 3.5 years policy experience is shocking. d. The Waiter Test: every time I have randomly had a waiter in the Northeast who is an MPP, its has been an American grad - not scientific... but to me its an indicator. DC is swimming with policy grads... I'm 3/3 for MPP waiters being from American. e. Career Routing Indicators: Never encountered a SPA student at any competitive blue chip internship (yes the definition of this can be subjective) - and I have been involved in Ed Policy, Defense, IR, Tech, and Regulations I'm sure there are amazing students at SPA, I mean they do send 5-7 students to the PMF, but its always better in my opinion to be with a strong cohort at large.

For IR and conflict studies and etc. it is much more academically accepted and welcome to have careers matriculating outside of academia upon graduation from PhD programs. Honestly, I just don't see a realistically pathway for you to research what you want to research just via a Master's program. Definitely not for a 1 year Master's program abroad. Also realistically, no one would respect your research in a master's program for you to easily to matriculate into a career from it (unless you piggy back into a research institute/respectable organization with your research and etc. - however that is much harder than you would imagine) I started focusing on defense issues in masters' program and realized I had to switch ASAP, because to do meaningful defense research means joining the community (one way or another). You won't have credibility to really do so as a Master's student. Much more likely so as a PhD. Also, I just realized another great school for what you are proposing is Tuft's Fletcher PhD. Maybe you have, but I don't think you have hit up the US defense/conflict/peace resolution community sufficiently. Given that you are American, it makes sense that is your opportunity bread and butter after your time abroad (and more realistically, its where the money, interest, and the community is most robust).

One thing you want to keep in mind is the ease / ability for you to come back to the US to do work/research after grad school. Bottom line, if you seek to eventually work (post PhD or Masters) you need to go to a US, UK, Australian, NZ, Canada (Basically Five Eyes) school, otherwise meaningful employment becomes difficult to do (at least in English). I know so many people in the social sciences who went to the best University in XYZ country and when they come back to the US, they were shocked to find out how their credentials had no real value. You know those stories of those Uber Drivers with PhDs from a foreign country who find that they can't use their degree --> don't let that be you just so you can be excited about research something.

Ultimately, I recommend you consider what sphere of policy you want to matriculate into. If you want to end up in: a. Federal consulting b. Capital Hill/Lobbying c. Drive hard on data and be the 1-2 McCourt students a year who end up think tanks - then McCourt makes sense to you. If you want to end up in: a. Policy Innovation (lets be honest, the Federal Government and DC follows, it doesn't really lead) b. State and Local policy (McCourt is very much structured towards all things Federal) c. Anything related to Tech d. Policy discover/research (as in you have no idea what policy areas you are interested in and you just want to explore. LBJ makes more sense to you. Additionally, if you care about padding your resume with DC area internships and are okay with going it alone, McCourt makes sense to you. If you care about having a supportive community and strong collaboration/professional development, LBJ makes more sense for you. I say all this because I had a McCourt classmate who transferred to LBJ because McCourt's policy focus areas were to cookie cutter for her and she wanted to focus on something unique and innovative. LBJ simply has way more policy focus areas that McCourt. Also, no one really considers culture prior to going to grad school, it is super important and can drive how well you do in the job market unless you are really mature.

This is the Catch 22. Bottom line, if you want funding, you will have to PhD - period. Instead of focusing on school, what I recommend is that you identify experts with University affiliations and ask them what they recommend you do. Send them a very direct question - if I want to do a PhD on this, where should I go across the English speaking world (don't dither about asking about Master's degree vs. PhD). That being said, I do know people who did research similar to you at Oxford

Georgetowns Security Studies Program masters should have everything are looking for. That being said, I think you are much better suited with a PhD given how the stuff you are looking for requires intense research. A masters program just prepare you for a government job and there is only so much research time available.

I can't speak to the MA (POLS) side, but I will speak t the MPP side. Stanford MPP is known as the ultimate example off a great university with a not so great policy program (the other being Cornell's Policy program). Even within California, Stanford MPP is not seen as one of the big players in the policy space among the policy schools (the big ones Cal-Goldman, USC - Price, UCLA - Luskin, and UCSD. Stanford MPP is simply is underinvested + under structured and those within the politics/IR space in Stanford (as PhDs) have informed me as such. I have never encountered a Stanford MPP in any professional setting or even heard of them matriculating into any role in the policy space (granted my experience comes from DC, but everyone goes to DC). As for joint degrees, unless you have a really particular career track in mind that necessitates both degrees (classic example are MDs who get their MPH to focus on public health oriented medicine or JDs who get an MBA to have an advantage in corporate financial matters) and are really intentional about it throughout the entire recruiting/academic process, you truly derive your economic value from one degree and the other degree is for fun.

You have to realize that they are so highly ranked because the US News rankings are based upon essentially a beauty contest among fellow academics. So basically academics reviewing each other. Syracuse Maxwell, to their credit is boosted in large part by their stellar PhD programs which are top notch and produce a high quality and quantity of research. Obviously, those benefits flow down to the Master's programs as well. Organizationally, Syracuse Maxwell also invests a lot in their programming and resources and have that down better than many other schools - and money and marketing does talk. That being said, I have not met many from Syracuse Maxwell min the professional policy space, but the few I have met have been stellar - really sharp folks who knew the cutting edge of research. You might want to check if their graduates' career outcomes align to your interests.

This is government affairs/international relations forum. Please delete your post and post in a theme more appropriate forum. Thanks!

I would be very surprised if SPIA accepted you in an ultra competitive year. Even if you have a good explanation for your lower quant grades, given how your GREs aren't higher (I am assuming they are in the 70s/80s percentile) and not 90s and that is time since undergrad, you aren't showing exactly a competitive trajectory.

You are above average competitiveness to my average classmate (granted mine was a low competitive application cycle). Being interested in budgetary policy/public finance is an interesting career track where: a. if you want to State/Local policy you are all set because there isn't exactly a pipeline for it and your resume would be Golden. Its not that hard to get into that, even though McCourt doesn't really do well for State/Local anything b. If you want to do Federal level budget/finance, then you have to compete against all the PhDs, Home Growns from undergrad, and MBAs/finance analytics masters folks. Basically - the competition pool surges. That being said, McCourt does send 1-2 people a year to OMB. McCourt also does have one of the most pre-eminent welfare/social security Economists, but she is not exactly what I call personable. Akerloff is a rock star, and if you gain his favor, that can help, but mostly in academic related circles. Bottom line, happy to give your perspective into your career journey, and I think you are in good shape no matter where you go to grad school. However, I think it helps to know as much you can.

I am not suggesting anything other than that, I would not be surprised if there was some lag for the middle group when they send out results (don't know if that have already or not).

Not saying I know for sure or based off of precedent in this particular case. However, usually grad programs know the stack of definitely admit and definitely reject first. Its the middle of maybes that gets resolved last.

My point is that UIC MPA would be net negative for you (at least, I don’t have enough information from you to assess otherwise), so I recommend you either apply next year when it is less competitive (to better schools) and hope you get good funding. Many do not pay sticker price and get some level of funding. It would be terrible for you to get a degree not worth your time and effort given limited career gain.

For grad schools the program matters more than the school. For example, I would discourage anyone from going to Cornell MPA or Stanford MPP because those programs are not highly regarded despite a well known University. The reverse is true for Georgia State whereby the program is amazing though the University is not that highly ranked. Programs matters because that is how you get jobs. New programs with no major funding or structural boost means job hunting will be challenging for you (at least for a post grad school level job).