MaxwellAlum

International relations is a very broad field.  What kinds of jobs/employers are you looking to work for?  In my experience, the people who are successful in this general field, and particularly within international development, have experience living and working abroad.  That's why a lot of people recommend Peace Corps.

@MaxwellAlum Yes, you are correct. I was misreading the contract and didn't realize that the World Bank was the one cashing the checks! Contracting agencies are mostly for-profit, so those' contractors are out of luck. Independent contractors can qualify if they're being paid by an appropriate PSLF employee.

@ExponentialDecay You're working pretty hard to turn my comments into some kind of screed against non-Americans, which was not remotely the intention of my original post. As I said in my follow up, many of the international students from my program will be the first ones to complain about how the difficulty of getting sponsored for a visa has hampered their career prospects in DC. The ones who took out loans are in the worst position because they need to earn American dollars for as long as they can to pay them off, even if they'd rather return home.
My goal here is not to talk shit behind my friends' backs, but rather to share the perspective of a somewhat recent graduate who hasn't become a cheerleader for the program, because that's what most applicants are going to encounter if they go to admissions events or ask to be put in touch with alumni. Do you really think that anyone who is unhappy with their IR master's experience is just a pathetic whiner? I'm not sure why you're so defensive about the fact that I am suggesting current applicants think long and hard about the financial trade-offs of these kinds of degrees. If money were no object, most of my points would be moot.
Also, you assume I applied straight from undergrad, but I actually entered my program in my mid-20s after two full-time jobs, one in the private sector abroad (not teaching English, FWIW) and one at a non-profit in a major US city. I had never worked in Washington, DC, though -- but if I had been able to achieve career success in this town before the degree, why would I have ever gone back to school?
I was hoping to use the master's to go from working with individual groups on the local level to effecting broader changes at a higher-level in my particular policy area. Maybe I was naive about what I as an individual would be able to achieve, or about how my stress about debt would stop me from pursuing more impactful policy jobs**. But I bet a lot of current applicants browsing gradcafe are equally naive, if not more so, considering how many classmates I had who came straight from undergrad and took out 6-figure loans. The point of my post was not to insult your life choices, but to provide a critical perspective for current applicants to consider. 
 
**I wasn't disparaging the private sector writ large. But I'm not sure how you can spin selling reports on healthcare policy so that hedge funds and major banks can know whether to invest in Aetna and Humana. Because that's the kind of work that a lot of "boutique consulting firms" in DC are doing, and it's where a lot of my classmates have ended up.

What do you want to do for the CDC/HUD/etc?  Do you want to do policy analysis?  Manage programs?  Be a budget analyst?  Have you thought about applying to jobs in state or local government health departments?  Doing so might give you a better sense of what you want to do with your career, and you might find you don't need another degree to get to where you want to be.  

Damn, sounds like that author had an axe to grind. I have plenty of criticisms of policy programs and I thought the article brought up some interesting points, like the trend of policy students preferring the private sector, and the perhaps too-cozy relationship between HKS and some powerful people (I witnessed this to a degree at SAIS). But the tone was really over-the-top, and some of the logical leaps were a bit specious.
The article argued that HKS has somehow lost its way, but it never really defined what this superior prior era was, other than suggesting there might have been fewer econ courses back then - which is not a good thing, IMHO.  
It's not an indictment of HKS that a few of its students later went on to do bad things. The author specifically mentioned Donald Heathfield, the Russian spy - well he fooled the US government into giving him citizenship while posing as a native-born Canadian who mysteriously happened to have a slight slavic accident (and the citizenship process involves in-person interviews, for the record), and Harvard revoked his degree after the arrest. Mentioning Heathfield twice as some kind of black mark against HKS just seems like mudslinging. 
I'm also not sure how the traditional MPP program having a 20% acceptance rate versus the law school's 16% somehow means that HKS has "abandoned America." The one-year mid-career program that the author speculates may have an acceptance rate closer to 50% probably is a prestige vehicle/cash cow, but that's true of a lot of similar one-year professional programs (see: the executive MBA). Not great, but not damning evidence that HKS has lost its way, in my view.
I think the article actually missed an opportunity to delve into how HKS and other policy programs have changed over time without all the cheap shots. The degree's price tag could have been discussed in more depth, as @MaxwellAlum mentioned, as well as the slow, arduous federal hiring process. Those two things combined are what drove me to the private sector - I have friends who got Presidential Management Fellowships who still weren't placed in full-time fed roles a year after graduation because of bureaucracy and security clearance BS.
It could have also discussed the proliferation of government contractors in greater depth - many of my friends work in the "private sector" but spend all their time on government contracts. In the case of development contractors, they're often making less money than they would be if they were working directly for USAID, so the decision to go private is hardly one motivated by greed. 
And unless I missed it, I didn't see comparisons of enrollment figures between now and 20, 30, 40 years ago. I would bet that HKS has expanded pretty rapidly since then, and this I could see as a real criticism of the school, as well as other policy programs. By the end of my time at SAIS, I felt that the bottom 10-20% of the class could have easily been cut without any negative effects on classroom discussion (in some cases, there might have been an improvement), and watching many people struggle to find employment after we graduated only underscored that belief. Even at a relatively elite master's program, there was still a fair amount of dead weight, but the school probably needed those students' tuition dollars, which often come via loans. I think it's ethically dubious to take advantage of young people's idealism in this way. These schools admit so many students who will spend the rest of their lives drowning in debt for degrees that get then mid-5-figure salaries in one of the highest cost of living cities in the country. 
 
 

I didn't attend HKS, but I know people who did, and I hold a public policy master's (from Syracuse) and now work in government.  I disagree with some of the premises of in the article.  I don't think it's easy to teach leadership in the classroom, and I personally wouldn't want to attend a master's program that was primarily focused on teaching soft skills.  I don't think it's bad to teach economics or quant.  You need those skills for many jobs in government, and I think it would be foolish to attend a program that lacked those components.  From what I can tell, HKS doesn't require less political science coursework than other public policy programs.  Syracuse's MPA had one course in this area, and I thought it was very valuable and just the right amount of political science for the degree program.
There's nothing wrong with students going into the private sector if that's what they want.  If indeed HKS is actively telling students that "you can make more of a difference in the private sector" - yeah I would find that a bit problematic and simplistic.  Public sector jobs have their frustrations, and I can absolutely understand people who choose to go to the private sector, but we as a society need more good people in government, and good people can and do make a difference.  On a side note, one of the things I loved about Syracuse was being surrounded by students and faculty who were truly committed to public service.  If that's not the case at HKS, that could be a disadvantage - it's nice to be around people with similar goals.
The main piece I agree with is that, given how much tuition HKS charges, if you are paying full freight, it's not conducive to building a career in public service.  Entering government with $140k in student debt is absurd.  So I would say think carefully about what your goals are and your own financial situation before attending (and consider MBAs if you're private sector oriented).  I have heard amazing things about HKS's career services, but I also wonder how much of the success of their alumni (and the alumni of any public policy school) is based on who they accept rather than the value they actually add.

Just throwing out there that the MPA at the Maxwell School (Syracuse) is a 12-month program, and they have some nonprofit and social policy focused courses, plus the core requirements which focus on management, budgeting and analysis skills you'll need for those administrative roles.

And its not impossible to get funding (I got offered like 80% of tuition with some research responsibilities)

One way to possibly minimize your risk is to go with an MPP, which is a more flexible degree.  I did a dual MPA/MAIR at the Maxwell School, and a surprising number of those of us who did the dual degree ended up working in local government, which can end up paying better than a lot of NGO jobs. It's easier to market yourself to a local government or otherwise domestic policy-focused job from an MPP than it is from an IR degree.  That can come in handy if, for example, you realize you really don't want to live in DC, New York or abroad.
I'd think carefully about specifically what kind of work you want to do. My fellow Maxwell alumni and I have so many different kinds of jobs that require very different types of skills.  For example, I do policy research, for which the statistics and economics skills are quite useful, while others are more involved in program coordination and contract management types of work.  Some folks work in very finance focused jobs (e.g. bond rating agencies).  Maybe neither of these degrees is the right one for you.  Not going to grad school now and getting some work experience instead as others have suggested might be a better option. A handful of folks I studied with at Maxwell, mostly those that didn't have a lot of prior work experience, ended up later getting another master's degree in a different field (e.g. finance, or in one case nutrition) when they had a better sense of where they wanted their career to go.

Yes, this is so important. Before grad school I used to feel likeI had so much extra money I could save on a very low salary living in a tiny room in a shared house with four other people and not going out much and rarely to restaurants.  Now I am 32 and my sigificantly higher salary feels much more constrained.  I spend more money for all the reasons you mentioned and I'm more aware of how much I need to set aside for retirement and for a down payment for a house.   Don't make the mistake I did of thinking that you'll be able to pay off your $50k in loans in 3 years by throwing half of your take home into your loans.  Unless you are getting help from other sources, you're going to want that money for something else.

Yeah. I also think it's really easy to dismiss money concerns when you're applying for these programs in your early-to-mid-20s.
$60k/yr sounded like a ton of money to me when I decided to go to SAIS. At that point, I was happy to be living with roommates in a cheaper city in a building with no laundry facilities. Socializing usually meant going to friends' houses or a dive bar.
I actually started closer to 70k after SAIS, but it didn't really feel like that much after higher rent in DC, loan payments, having to buy a fancier work wardrobe, increased "adult" expenditures (like my parents no longer occasionally paying for stuff, getting half a dozen wedding invitations every year, and socializing becoming more expensive now that the default is dinner/drinks at nicer restaurants), etc. And now that I'm pushing 30, I'm starting to have thoughts like - will I ever be able to afford a condo, let alone a house? Will I ever be able to have kids, and if so, will I be able to help them with college considering I'll be paying off my own loans until my late 30s? (Now imagine that question for people who go on 25-year repayment plans)....

Agreed.  Taking out much more than $100k is a big risk in this respect.  At $100-$120k in loans, a person's income-based payments will probably at least cover the interest or most of it after 5-7 years of salary growth in a good government job. If you're anywhere near $200k in total student loan debt, you're really looking at a balance that will grow significantly over 25 years on a public sector salary and an income-based plan, and that's going to result in a massive tax hit in the absence of public service loan forgiveness.  The interest will make it really tough to make a dent in a balance like that.  There are options for dealing with tax hits (installment plans, a personal loan/home equity loan) but it's still a huge cost, for a degree that probably didn't increase your income much.

Check out median starting salaries coming out of these programs. Even the most elite range from $55-90k annual. I am talking about Hopkins SAIS, Fletcher MALD, Georgetown MSFS, and Columbia SIPA. 
These numbers are abysmal when you consider the perceived prestige of the programs, the competitiveness to get in, and the (usually very significant) prior work experience of the entering class. Top-tier public and international affairs programs cannot compete on salary with even third-tier regional MBA programs.
I went for the intrinsic value and because it was a life-long dream, but I would advise all out there to be very careful about "just going" and to drive a hard bargain if you get in. Paying full or nearly-full tuition just isn't worth it for at least 80% of prospective applicants.   

I agree with most of what you said in your post, kb6.  I don't think taking on six-figure debt for an MPP is a smart idea.  However, for the sake of those folks with six-figure debt, I will say I personally know several people in this situation who are definitely not living with roommates in their mid-30s or racking up credit card debt.  They are on income-based repayment plans, which allows them a lot of flexibility in terms of saving, career choices, etc.  Yes, they run the risk of making payments for 25 years/forever, but that basically means they are 10% poorer than they would be without the debt (current income-based plans allow you to pay a maximum of 10% of your income above poverty level).  Not the best outcome, especially for a degree that you could get for much less money at a different school or with aid, but hardly the nightmare situation that some describe. 
Folks, if you are racking up credit card debt because of your federal student loans you need to get on an income-based repayment plan immediately.  It makes zero sense to pay 15% to 20% interest on a credit card to pay down loans with a 7% rate.

Yes, I definitely know people taking advantage of IBR to make their day-to-day lives manageable - as far as I'm aware, there are no SAIS grads sleeping under a bridge! But with the exception of those who qualify for PSLF, I think a lot of them are going to feel pretty bitter when that massive tax bill comes due in 20-25 years. Depending on the loan amount, IBR might not even cover the interest payment, allowing the total amount owed to actually increase over time...
Again, my intention is not to make people feel bad about the debt they've already taken out, but more to warn prospective students who haven't yet signed the dotted line.

Many people spend $50k or less on their public policy degrees - they can do this through merit aid (which is more common than you may think) and/or paying in-state tuition at a public university.  5 years ago, I ended up taking out just under $50k in loans for a dual degree (two years) at the Maxwell School with the help of significant merit aid.
Given the existing income-based repayment programs, theoretically you can take out any amount of federal loans (up to the cost of attendance), get a government job, and still not be destitute.  While I can't guarantee these programs will be in place or unchanged when you graduate, there hasn't been much talk of getting rid of them (Public Service Loan Forgiveness is another story).  I know several people who took out $100k+ in loans for their public policy degrees, and they are generally fine financially.  They make their income-based payments every month, so even though they are not necessarily making a dent in their loan balances (their balances may even be increasing as the interest accrues), they are not at risk of defaulting on their loans.  
But one thing I think a lot of us realized after we graduated is that public sector and nonprofit employers generally do not pay people more money because they attended Harvard instead of the University of Maryland or SUNY Albany.  You are very likely to start your job out of grad school and find yourself working with people from all types of academic backgrounds, and the high performers succeed and get promoted because of how they work, not where they studied.  Of the people I know with $100k+ in loans, I think they could easily be making the same amount of money without the six-figure degree.  Some of their peers did end up in high-paying consulting gigs, and that may very well be worth the cost of the degree.  However, I am of the mind that, if you want to go into consulting, you should just get an MBA.  If you want to go into government, you are not going to make substantially more money because you went to Harvard.
Bottom line is that if you really, really want to, you're not going to completely ruin your life by taking out $140-$150k in loans.  But it very likely will not be worth the investment, given that it is possible to spend a lot less on the same degree somewhere else.

Many people spend $50k or less on their public policy degrees - they can do this through merit aid (which is more common than you may think) and/or paying in-state tuition at a public university.  5 years ago, I ended up taking out just under $50k in loans for a dual degree (two years) at the Maxwell School with the help of significant merit aid.
Given the existing income-based repayment programs, theoretically you can take out any amount of federal loans (up to the cost of attendance), get a government job, and still not be destitute.  While I can't guarantee these programs will be in place or unchanged when you graduate, there hasn't been much talk of getting rid of them (Public Service Loan Forgiveness is another story).  I know several people who took out $100k+ in loans for their public policy degrees, and they are generally fine financially.  They make their income-based payments every month, so even though they are not necessarily making a dent in their loan balances (their balances may even be increasing as the interest accrues), they are not at risk of defaulting on their loans.  
But one thing I think a lot of us realized after we graduated is that public sector and nonprofit employers generally do not pay people more money because they attended Harvard instead of the University of Maryland or SUNY Albany.  You are very likely to start your job out of grad school and find yourself working with people from all types of academic backgrounds, and the high performers succeed and get promoted because of how they work, not where they studied.  Of the people I know with $100k+ in loans, I think they could easily be making the same amount of money without the six-figure degree.  Some of their peers did end up in high-paying consulting gigs, and that may very well be worth the cost of the degree.  However, I am of the mind that, if you want to go into consulting, you should just get an MBA.  If you want to go into government, you are not going to make substantially more money because you went to Harvard.
Bottom line is that if you really, really want to, you're not going to completely ruin your life by taking out $140-$150k in loans.  But it very likely will not be worth the investment, given that it is possible to spend a lot less on the same degree somewhere else.

Just to stir the conversation a bit, I am currently enrolled in SPEA's MPA program. For starters, none of the students I have talked to, including myself, actually think that SPEA carries more weight than HKS or WWS. The MPA rankings are flawed to a degree because not only are they opinion based, but there is no standardized metric as to what constitutes an MPP/MPA degree. Most programs offer two separate degrees, an MPA (public administration) typically offered to mid-career professionals and an MPP (public policy). However, some programs such as SPEA and LBJ offer only one degree, an MPA, but it is public affairs rather than administration and students choose whether to focus on policy analysis or administration. Likewise, WWS calls their public policy degree an MPA. The confusion is compounded when incorporating IR, which is included in some schools' public affairs programs, whereas other schools like GW and Georgetown have separate public policy and IR schools. 
Having said that, the rankings do carry a degree of weight in determining the quality of the program. While Indiana is a good but not elite public university, SPEA is without a doubt a top MPA program. The school attracts students from top undergraduates (Northwestern, Cornell, Notre Dame, Berkeley) and the faculty is as good as anywhere,  but whether that equates to top 10 or 15, who knows, and to be honest it doesn't really matter. These aren't law schools. I know people here who turned down Chicago and Northwestern's MPP/MPA programs because SPEA fit much more with their goals for a quarter of the debt they would have taken on from the more brand name schools. I personally had looked into the MPA programs at both Brown and UPenn and determined both were pretty crappy and provided zero reason to choose them over Indiana. It really comes down to personal goals, how the program fits into what you want to do, and if you can achieve it at an affordable price. 
I will give Indiana praise in two specific areas, however. First of all, unlike many of the other policy schools discussed on these boards, SPEA is not a cash-cow program. I'm actually going to graduate with no debt and I didn't even receive a scholarship (I did work for several years before coming back to school though, so I had some money saved up). Second, the program offers a tremendous amount of flexibility to tailor your program to your personal goals. Many policy programs require a ton of core classes and little flexibility for electives, but SPEA lets you personalize almost everything, including independent studies with professors and courses in other departments. 
So go with what works for you. I would argue that location isn't as big a deal as others are making it out to be. Plenty of SPEA students land internships and jobs in DC  (it has the largest public affairs alumni network), and don't have to deal with paying an extra $10k a year in rent while in school. I lived in DC for four years before going back to school, and I can tell you first hand that many non-brand name policy programs place people in DC (ex: Maryland, Texas A&M, Rutgers). Also keep in mind that these are programs designed for public/quasi-public positions, and going $100k+ in debt just to say you went to ___ is going to do more harm than good. Read through the forum here about how people took out massive loans for SAIS or SIPA and it's become a huge burden as they try to get their lives going post-grad, especially in an expensive city like DC. Keep in mind that these are professional schools, and you shouldn't even be applying to programs if you don't know what you want to do with the degree, so finding a program that suits you shouldn't be a hassle (given you have options). 
There are only a handful of other highly ranked programs that would have provided me the same specific curriculum that I'm tailoring at SPEA, and they all would have left me with some debt. If I could have attended any program debt free that provided me the same specific curriculum, I probably would have gone elsewhere, but for my specific situation (career goals and financing) Indiana just worked. Having said all that, if you want to go into NGO IR or go the PhD route, the brand name schools will give you a noticeable leg up. I'm not, so it doesn't matter for me. 

Federal workers I know are all worried about losing their jobs and/or the prospect of being forced to undo all of the work their agencies have done for the past eight years.  Many of my friends in nonprofits that rely on federal funds are worried about getting defunded.  Definitely look at state and local government (there are actually tens of thousands of counties and municipalities in the US) and private sector (they might benefit from the federal hiring freeze if agencies are forced to outsource).  If you are looking to work internationally, seek out an internship at the UN and take the YPP exam.  But I suspect everyone working in the public policy arena will be impacted in some way, if not immediately than within a year or two.

There are advantages to both.  I started grad school four years after finishing undergrad.   I was a bit unfocused out of undergrad, and pursuing an MPA did not occur to me at the time.  In the meantime I worked for a nonprofit in a mostly administrative position.  I learned a lot in that position, including just the basics of how to work in an office environment.  That job helped me figure out what I liked and what I didn't like and inspired me to pursue the MPA.  I easily got a government job out of grad school, and I do think my work experience before grad school made me a more attractive candidate (though my grad school internship was more directly relevant to the job).  I also think I feel more certain of my career path than I otherwise would and have a better understanding of general organizational management issues, which helps me in my current role.
That being said, my government job out of grad school at age 28 was an entry level position with a very entry level salary.  That salary has since grown considerably, but if I had gone to grad school straight out of undergrad, I could conceivably have gotten a very similar job out of grad school and started progressing earlier salary-wise.  While my job after undergrad helped me a lot from a personal development standpoint, it did not help qualify me for more advanced positions out of grad school.
I don't regret my choices because I don't think I would have known to do the MPA when I was straight out of undergrad.  I am also feel grateful that I am in the right career path for my skills and interests.  I am not sure that would be the case if I had tried to go to grad school straight out of college.  But I am a little envious of my college friends who are four years ahead of me career-wise because they essentially started earlier.

It helps people who borrow a lot the most (that's why the program is becoming increasingly controversial).  For people who have $50k or more in debt, it's pretty easy to go on the income-based plan and not really make much of a dent in your balance over several years, because you end up just barely covering the interest on a public sector salary.  Factor in that the money you save on your loan payment, you can put in a retirement fund and get a better return on that, it makes a lot of sense for many people to do income-based repayment and hope for PSLF (caveat - I do NOT recommend borrowing more than $50k on the basis of potentially getting PSLF - those loan payments, even if they are income-based, hurt a lot more when you're also supporting a family).

There are advantages to both.  I started grad school four years after finishing undergrad.   I was a bit unfocused out of undergrad, and pursuing an MPA did not occur to me at the time.  In the meantime I worked for a nonprofit in a mostly administrative position.  I learned a lot in that position, including just the basics of how to work in an office environment.  That job helped me figure out what I liked and what I didn't like and inspired me to pursue the MPA.  I easily got a government job out of grad school, and I do think my work experience before grad school made me a more attractive candidate (though my grad school internship was more directly relevant to the job).  I also think I feel more certain of my career path than I otherwise would and have a better understanding of general organizational management issues, which helps me in my current role.
That being said, my government job out of grad school at age 28 was an entry level position with a very entry level salary.  That salary has since grown considerably, but if I had gone to grad school straight out of undergrad, I could conceivably have gotten a very similar job out of grad school and started progressing earlier salary-wise.  While my job after undergrad helped me a lot from a personal development standpoint, it did not help qualify me for more advanced positions out of grad school.
I don't regret my choices because I don't think I would have known to do the MPA when I was straight out of undergrad.  I am also feel grateful that I am in the right career path for my skills and interests.  I am not sure that would be the case if I had tried to go to grad school straight out of college.  But I am a little envious of my college friends who are four years ahead of me career-wise because they essentially started earlier.

I'm gonna chip in with my two cents. I don't think it's out of the question to be able to minimize debt for a policy degree. It's not always easy, but I think there are a few things people can do to maximize their chances:
Warning: I read over this and it sounds kinda preachy. Sorry 'bout that.
1) Get work experience. (Already discussed in this thread.)
2) Do a lot of background research on your programs to make sure you're a good fit/the programs fit what you're looking for. I think it's underestimated how much being a good fit for a program can help your application. (I.e.: Being a stellar student/professional is one thing. Being a good fit for a program can also really help your chances. Know why you're applying to a particular program.)
3) Spend a lot of time on your apps (especially essays). Fellowships can't fall out of the sky. You have to put effort into those apps!
4) Apply to a variety of schools (reaches as well as some other programs in order to hopefully give you some leverage to negotiate when offers come in.)
5) Be willing to give the application process several shots if it doesn't go right the first time. Don't put all the eggs into the grad school basket. Grad school will be there year after year. It's not going anywhere.
If you really prioritize putting in a strong application and minimizing debt, I think coming out with a small amount of loans can be done. There is absolutely no reason why a policy student should graduate with unmanageable amounts of debt unless you were hellbent on getting that master's degree. I think in terms of academic growth, a policy degree offers a lot to aspiring public sector professionals, but if we're discussing the dollar value of that degree--it ain't much! (I say this as a policy student who is very proud to be studying policy, so don't get me wrong.)
Anyway, that's my two cents. Feel free to disagree, of course. Good luck on apps for anyone applying!

I think it depends on where you choose to apply.  Many reputable but less prestigious schools offer good amounts of aid to attract the types of candidates who might otherwise go to SIPA/HKS etc.

Yeah I mentioned this already above,