went_away

Craft a compelling, cohesive narrative (you're well on your way) and I could see you landing full-tuition scholarship. I would say go for it if you can get a top-10 school to pony up the money. Where I would caution you is the schools you've listed and your perception that a grad degree from one of them will necessarily set you up better for a job than you are right now. An undergrad degree from Emory is just as good or better than many public policy master's programs (from a jobs competitiveness perspective) and may put you in a strong enough position to get the job you want without the master's degree.

I agree 100% with all the other posters. Tacking on an MA in IR will do ABSOLUTELY NOTHING to enhance you chances of getting into an elite MBA program, and will most likely be entirely superfluous to your job opportunities upon graduation. If you don't have the profile now to get into a good MBA, you won't have it after your first year at SAIS/SIPA/Fletcher/Gtown either. Another thing - MA programs in IR are not set up to help you with language skills; I'm not sure where you got that idea. Spend some quality time (like 80-100 hours) of perusing the Poets and Quants website to get a feel for what you need to get into a top MBA program and what it can do for you. If you want the glamorous, high-powered career in international business you're going to have to be good enough to get into at least a top 20 school or so (think UNC Kennan Flagler or UW Foster as minimally acceptable for 'international strategy' - http://poetsandquants.com/2016/11/21/2016-poetsquants-mba-ranking/3/ ). Obviously, YMMV and every case is different. Some people manage to get this sort of career through Harvard Kennedy or Princeton Wilson alone, but you need to have a strong profile period to be able to land these private sector offers. If you do really want to scratch the IR itch, you could check out Wharton's dual MA/MBA program. They'll let you do both in 2 yearsish, so it shouldn't tack on too much extra time or debt. https://mba.wharton.upenn.edu/lauder-program/ A friend of mine is currently doing that program and seems pretty happy with it. But of course - you'll have to have the right profile to get in in the first place.

There is one place and one place only that you belong: Georgetown School of Security Studies. Go there, and things will work out fine, presuming you don't mind paying the outrageous tuition prices. To get in, you'll need to get on the internship/research assistant band wagon ASAP. The more professional writing and analysis you can do before applying, the better. You say your work experience doesn't apply to IR, but it might if you know how to frame it (especially if you can contextualize it with your love for security studies, keeping people safe, our great country's opportunities, blah, blah, blah). You aren't super young, so this is the time to be going to grad school. I am guessing your status as a McNair scholar + strong GPA will be your ticket in. On the negative side, your undergraduate major is rather unfortunate, as are your language skills. You may need to do a stint in the peace corps or military to be taken more seriously both before and after grad school, but you may be a little beyond that at this point in your life.

I could see a 1-year program at a top institution doing you quite a lot of good as you sound like the sort of person who knows how to extract the maximum value possible out of an experience. If you're currently pulling down in the mid six to seven figures in income, the type of person you'll be able to network with at a good grad school will be quite high level and probably able to help you advance in your goals. You'll just have to be extremely focused and know what you want to get out of the experience. I had someone similar to you in my cohort and he's since used the experience to great effect (recruited a high-level connection to serve on his board of directors and leveraged another personal connection to get a CEO position and other resume enhancers).

If you want to work specifically in security I would recommend St Andrews. Regardless, you will struggle in this field if you lack a clearance, military background, or cyber skills.

St Andrews is definitely better if my LinkedIn contacts are a good indicator. They dominate at Control Risk and the like. Georgetown is *by far* the best worldwide (for security studies!), though probably too expensive.

Thank you. I believe this point of view will increasingly become conventional wisdom as public knowledge catches up with reality and the very difficult and weak job market for most IR grads. I work with, socialize with, supervise, and hire master's IR grads (hundreds in total) and believe me - it's tough out there. I was just at an extremely large event in DC and more than half of the grads with whom I spoke (they graduated 2-3 years ago for the most part) were precariously employed, under employed, on temporary contracts, or unemployed. I love this field and have devoted the last 12 years of my life to it, but barring lots of family money, get a big scholarship or don't go.

I generally agree with this post. The main difference between the Kennedy and Wilson Schools that I was alluding to above is that their funding situation is completely different. Kennedy provides little or no tuition support for the majority of their students and VERY few receive full funding. In contrast, Wilson provides full funding as a matter of course. This difference is so large that I would place them in completely separate categories. It speaks to the size of each school's endowment, which is one of the strongest statements of its strength on the job market and other measures of effectiveness. A top school official from Kennedy has posted extensively here on this topic and on how Kennedy would love to provide funding for its students but simply does not have anywhere near the resources the business or law school does. Having said that, sure - if Kennedy had the institutional resources to provide full funding to its students then I would agree you'd be splitting hairs in comparing them. Speaking personally, if money weren't an issue, I also would probably rather be at Harvard/Cambridge than at Princeton because of the city and the wider university opportunities.

Now you're just flaming.

If you disagree with something I wrote, make a point. Maybe I'll agree with you! Please don't attack me personally.

I wouldn't recommend you go to any of those schools for that level of debt. There's no doubt Fletcher is a whole lot better than Korbel - which is a very weak program - but not even Fletcher will do all that much for you if you don't have that much going for you already. 'IR' isn't really a field, so you're going to have to be much more specific in articulating what it is you would like to do. A 4-week coding boot camp will do more for your career prospects than a two year grad degree from a SAIS or Fletcher.

The Wilson School is ranked MUCH higher than the Kennedy school. They're not even really in the same league.

The Bush School is far better than SIS and focuses on security vs development at American. The fact that you're a veteran with a clearance makes this even easier: Texas wins hands down.

Sure that's more or less accurate, but you can't really compare all these programs to each other. They have different constituencies and students have different career interests. Usually I would separate international affairs from public policy.

The above posters are right: with decent essays, GRE and recommendations you're right in line for a no-scholarship or low-scholarship offer at a Fletcher or SAIS sort of place. You're probably borderline at SIPA. A couple of points: I wouldn't characterize your work experience as 'great,' but as 'standard' or 'decent.' Don't expect it to power you into a top program. Also, recommendations from members of Congress are not necessarily a good idea, unless they know you personally and are committed to writing a good letter. A detailed, positive letter from a chief of staff would be far, far more powerful than a generic letter from a powerful person.

If you're already working in the field and somewhat happy with your current employer and opportunities, this looks like a good move.

Both should serve you about the same. I would highly, highly, highly recommend you join the national guard or military in some form and pair that with the MA if these are really the jobs you want. You'll struggle to break into any of those fields without military experience; it's kind of a mafia.

No don't go. It won't get you a job in the US with a visa. If you come to the US for school, get an MBA. If you want to pursue development I would suggest working another 1-5 years to improve your professional profile and move up the career ladder before getting a master's degree in IR.

Yes. DC is about power, not money.

Probably yes.

It matters not one bit.

That's a great list. I would add one program to it - Harvard's Master's of Education. I know a lot of people with your profile who have gone there. It's not as powerful as an MPA from Kennedy, but would send a strong signal of your expertise in and commitment to education that would be helpful for employment purposes given that this is the field you want to be in.

If you're going to make the terrible decision of going into that much debt, you might as well go for broke and go to SIPA. Your chances of landing a relatively well-paid job are much, MUCH higher in NYC than they are in DC.

Lol yes go to Wisconsin no brainer.

Now go do some good in the world.