Zahar Berkut

That's a stellar GRE score, and it is definitely what you want to get into a top program. The GPA may or may not cause issues, but the best you can do to overcome that is write a stellar statement, possibly include some note about grading standards in your program (hopefully someone else can comment more on that), and show in your writing sample that you're good at the kind of work you want to do. Good luck!

Yes, retake the GRE. Worst case scenario, there's always the following year to apply to programs. I also strongly recommend discussing your situation with the professor you do research for, least of all for advice on what programs to apply to based on your research interests. On a side note, the fact that you are thinking of applying to public policy schools in addition to PhD programs makes me think you are not totally sure about going down that path. Do you want to be a professor? If not, you are probably much better off applying to a professional school. While you can take the PhD in whatever direction you want after you get it, the time you spend working toward it and not earning a real salary could have been used to advance yourself professionally.

Your stats seem good enough to be competitive for funding at U Chicago's MAPSS or CIR, where they offer full tuition to about 5% of applicants (but you're on your own for living expenses). You can consider a Boren if your interests cover IR or CP, but there's a service requirement of 1 year to the US gov. Otherwise, the only funding I know is the FLAS for area studies programs-- you can try to investigate individual schools to see if they offer that scholarship to students who supplement polisci programs with language study. I'm afraid it's slim pickings for terminal MA's in the social sciences-- these programs are themselves often cash cows to support PhD students.

Well, there are certain difficulties you'd face in finding them, but there are some there. NGO's that survived the government's registration requirements would probably take international interns, and you can look into individual companies if you know they have Russia offices. Some think tanks like having native English speakers, and UNDP may or may not be doing work in the region. The problem is just figuring out what's out there, but if your school has a center for Russian/East European Studies they may be connected. There are also websites like http://expru.blogspot.com/. It's a real grab bag, but legit companies post here and you can investigate later if they also offer internships.

Sigaba wins thegradcafe. Also, as healthy as I think this encounter will ultimately be for the original poster, and as bizarrely sincere it is of him to use his real name and photograph (at least, I hope it's actually him who posted this and not some other malicious student), he should probably know for future reference that it's quite risky to leave your Facebook completely visible to the public, and could lead to long-term consequences with future employers.

Unsure about Harvard's application pool, but good summer programs might include Arizona State, Indiana, and U Pitt. They may or may not offer money-- I think Arizona does, and they have an unusual program that actually combines overseas and in-state study. I've heard positive things about all of them. Also check American Councils for summer Russian study programs. A popular summer program in Russia is Moscow State's, but I don't know how it's organized.

If somehow this wasn't clear, the PhD program in government or political science is training to become a professor. The HKS PhD might be useful in a career outside academia.

That is indeed the way it goes. I had to ask housing to pass my information on with a request for a call so I could ask my soon-to-be roommate to pick up my keys. Apparently, they don't consider themselves authorized to tell people who they'll be living with. -__- Beers sound good, too.

It may help to think of it this way: you don't need a master's at all to enter a PhD program, but doing so can help demonstrate your ability to handle graduate-level coursework and develop a research/writing record. Whereas while you don't in principle need a master's to enter public affairs, massive numbers of positions do require one, especially if it speaks to policy/economic analysis skills. So the master's can only make you a stronger candidate if you apply to a PhD program down the road, even if it's difficult to say just how much better you'd look on paper (I can't speak to GSPIA unfortunately). If it's possible to do a master's thesis on a topic-- and using a methodology-- that would be of interest to academics, so much the better. Remember that very high GRE scores and an excellent personal statement and writing sample can help you break into a higher tier, too.

Coming in a little late on the 19th, and kind of wondering if we're going to be told who our roommates are in grad housing before we show up.

"I want to earn a masters because I want to develop a lot better understanding of the field of international affairs, as following law school I want to work in international policy/diplomacy/government/NGO work/journalism/something of the sort." Agree with the above poster. If those are your career goals, are you even sure you want to go to law school? You can go into any one of those fields without the three years and massive cost of a JD, and a degree from a top international/public affairs school ought to qualify you equally well. And even if you do decide to go int his direction after law school, you don't actually need the extra master's or even a strong undergrad background to work in any of them. Internships/work experience are far more important. I would advise you to talk to your university's career services to get their opinion before committing yourself to years of more expensive schooling.

Any of the schools on the list below will give you the professional training and internship opportunities you'll need to enhance your career prospects: http://www.apsia.org/apsia/members/allMembers.php?section=member

I certainly hope you're right, but low scores can present a high barrier to be overcome. Have you talked to your undergrad advisers to get their thoughts on your competitiveness? A friend, for instance, spoke to a top 10 grad program's admission office where she did her MA, and was told (according to her version of the story, mind you) not to bother applying without a certain level quant score (it was a formal-heavy school). I imagine it was phrased more like, "you would be far less competitive than most of the students we take." As for thinking outside the box... a lot of students talk about the heavy professionalization component of grad programs, ostensibly designed to teach you the ropes of the discipline, but in effect constraining the range of topics that your peers would be interested in. That may be the bigger concern you face as consider the PhD.

I'm sure it will help, but many schools "appear" to have cut-off scores for GRE and possibly GPA to help them go through applications quickly, so you should have some confidence that your numbers are in an acceptable margin for the top tier programs.

I have heard very often that many political science admissions committees ignore the GRE writing score because they can see your writing themselves in your writing sample. While I have also heard that low AW grades "look bad," and that the "average" student at a top 10 department has a 5.5, they also insist that all candidates are evaluated on an individual basis. Given that you are an international student, that your math score is perfect (the most important number), and that your verbal score is actually EXCELLENT for a non-native English speaker, I expect you to still be competitive. Just make sure you put in a lot of effort drafting the personal statement and really proving to the admissions committee why your background and your interests match the department well. If you are planning to do more quantitative or formal theory work, the writing score probably matters even less. Be sure to clean up the tiny little grammatical errors that you might have in the documents you submit in your application. I can see a few verb tense and preposition problems in the writing above-- having studied a few languages myself, I totally empathize with these difficulties. Most native English speakers don't realize what a nightmare our verb system can be, even if we're blessed not to have real conjugations.

I'm starting my MA in my area of interest next fall, and I've been asked for advice by a lot of friends about similar programs they might want to look into themselves (in different regions, nonetheless). But aside from pointing them to the Department of Education info page for FLAS, I'm not sure how to find any sort of guide to researching programs. Being interdisciplinary, it would seem knowing particular faculty matters like it would for researching any PhD program, but program organization and reputation should matter in their own right. And of course, it would help to put someone to a list of programs... but for my area at least, the closest I could find were listings of national language resource centers, each of which may or may not administer master's programs. And then there is the question of "ranking," which I fear falls into the vacuous category of school-wide reputation for this sort of thing. Any advice or experience anyone would like to share that I might be able to pass on to other hopefuls?

It may be worth investigating schools that have a dual IR/Law program, usually something that will let you complete your course of study in an extra year. But are you planning to go to law school in Canada? And is the goal of the MA to make you more competitive for a top law program? Competitiveness can also be won if your work experience is impressive, and you'd also earn some money in the process by taking that route. And if the tuition of law school in Canada is manageable, that should weigh on how much you're willing to drop on an MA at LSE, Oxbridge, etc.

Thank you for posting your experience, Balderdash. I think this will be an important cautionary tale for a lot of future applicants.

Are they on your department's website? The main explore courses page still has not been updated.

Does anyone knows when next year's courses will actually be posted? Everyone told me mid-July, and it seems like they're quite late this year. Registration opens next week!

As if often mentioned in this forum, you may want to apply to strong terminal MA programs in addition to PhD's on the offchance your GPA poses an issue at top schools. You could spent a year in that program and get new rec's/reset your academic record and writing sample (even if you're willing to produce a new paper independently). Just a back-up option-- you still sound competitive even with the academic issues you went through.

A friend of mine from high school went to New College, and she's doing her master's at Cambridge. I figure if they can figure out your grading system, LSE should be able to as well. But really, that's something you should ask your school registrar about directly, since they would have to deal with this issue all the time.

Would an MA in political science really help your career prospects? It's my understanding that most terminal master's programs in political science are designed as stop-gaps to doctoral studies. Public policy and international affairs MA's (like those of the APSIA schools) are considered to be the way to go to enhance career prospects. A good compromise MA program is the University of Chicago's Committee on International Relations (CIR), which lets you custom design your coursework and generally sends the majority of its grads into the work force.

You'll have better luck in the Government Affairs forum-- nonetheless, let me say that it is difficult to justify a dual master's in public policy and international affairs because an international affairs degree effectively "is" a slightly more specialized public policy degree.

You are absolutely competitive at any top-ranked institution. Your quant is on the lower range of Stanford's average (770), but it is most definitely in range, and your other stats are impressive. Pick another top 10 institution or three that would fit well with you-- it's often as much about dumb luck in terms of who a school wants at a moment as your stellar stats. If you're so inclined, I pick the Red Cross.