Phoenix2021

Heads up that many students who applied by the late Jan deadline heard back the second week of March last year. The emails were sent out on Friday, 3/06. Also, anyone here attending in-person events for admitted students this week? The campus tour was yesterday. (For those wondering, they hold two rounds. There will be a second for students admitted later so don't worry if you think you're missing out.)

Apologies, I think I forgot to answer this twice. Yes, I know some! I'm mostly going off of the Linkedin profiles/social media updates of second-years I know personally or tangentially. Most seem to have relevant background experience, and used Harris experience and (endless) connections to pivot it seems. I only know two semi-personally since I'm a first-year. One was in the IB formerly, another a global development IGO interestingly enough. I know this is vague but hopefully it's better than nothing. I don't want to misrepresent a small sample size. Cheers!

Hey - first of all, congrats on getting in! Secondly, when I was accepted formally through the portal the bottom of my page had a link directly to a second letter - my financial aid award. I got them at the same time. If you were admitted earlier, perhaps they are still finalizing it. However, for me the experience was: email that my portal was updated, notification on portal of unread message, message taking me to acceptance letter, link to second letter of financial aid found at the bottom of letter. Let me know if your experience was any different or the second letter was missing. Interested to hear this, but again I was accepted later than you in the cycle. Don't be worried you didn't receive any scholarship. Everyone I've met has received between $10-$25k, with a small set of outliers who received over $25k. Just my personal experience.

Don't fret, many are accepted without a substantial quant background. Many in my cohort have no formal coding skills or job experience. That's why emphasizing how you want to join Harris to gain quant skills to pivot to a new field or strengthen your career potential is crucial for your motivation statement. Just look at recent student profiles. For those who attend, the Core will be challenging regardless of background. Everyone takes the same 3 classes: Analytical Politics, Micro, and Stats. Finals are next week so it's been tough. Can't recommend attending Math and Coding Camp enough if you've never used R. If you don't attend camp and have no experience with R, the learning curve will be steep. The vast majority do and there are remote options for international students. On that note, Python/Stata aren't part of the Core at all. It's been 100% R-focused so far and I'd say easily the majority of students are pretty new to it. NOT discouraging anyone from attending Harris. Once you get past the Core you can choose electives that require few to no quant skills. Loving it here so far, seems like the sky's the limit and the quality/diversity of the student body is mind-boggling. Already heard of almost 20 first-years working with/interviewing for the World Bank, just for one example. P.S. We never got a Thanksgiving email. Received my decision on December 13th iirc. Based on these posts my strong suspicion is decisions will be delayed as well so don't panic if it takes longer for you all to hear back. Best of luck everyone.

Hey everyone, I'm a first-year MPP student at Harris - more than glad to answer questions about my application experience/impressions of the program so far! Classes begin on the 27th... but the student body's already been attending the three-week Math and Coding Camp (meant to prepare students for the quant-heavy curriculum) since August 30th. I've been taking in-person classes five days a week this entire month and participating in many other events so I already feel fairly immersed in the program. As of now, I have nothing but positive things to say about Harris. Of course I'll have far more detailed responses to share over the course of the next few weeks after the quarter officially starts next week. So feel free to shoot me any questions! I'll do my best to respond in a timely manner. I know it's a stressful process. I've been there - would love helping others who were in my spot last year. (Edit: For the sake of discretion, if you have more personal questions please message me so we can connect directly. In the meanwhile, wishing you all the best of luck!)