mv0027

I would suggest the one that will give you the most research experience (i.e. thesis and RA opportunities). So from that list I would cross off SAIS and SIPA. Also, not sure how much the work experience at the WB or UN will help you with admission to PhD unless it is in the stats department or research department. good luck!

hmmm...you seem to be missing my emphasis on the academic credibility of programs, not job placement, networks, etc. So I'll let this one die at that. Berkeley doesn't have an IR department/school. I assume you are referring to their public policy school. I suppose comparing a public policy school to an IR program (which is apple to oranges) underscores my original point though.

@ JAubrewy WWS and Yale are also top programs, I just didn't think to go into that much detail. I guess my "blindness" caused me to overlook the conventional wisdom of forums....the only thing that matters is online rankings from US news and the like!! Common JAubrey, think outside the rankings box! You are gonna compare a UCSD program to the University of Denver? American? SAIS, Korbel, Turfts, and GW (again) just don't have the academic credibility that UCSD has. They are strong programs with good reputations that have great networks. So, if that is your criteria, I agree that they might be "better" but they don't have the academic big-hitters that the other programs have. Again, they have ex-government people (Condi Rice-types). Also, you have to think about bang for your buck! All those schools are private....80k in loans for an IR degree?!?!?!? Bad idea. @ ILYuna I was MPIA. I didn't apply anywhere else because I planned on working one more year before school. I visited IR/PS, really liked it, and just couldn't handle my job anymore so decided to go for it. One of the best professional (and personal) decisions I ever made.... Oh, I was focused on international economics while at IR/PS. The program is trying to grow, so assuming you went to a decent undergrad institution, have some type of international experience (work, volunteer, study), and more than a 3.something GPA, you should be able to get in. IR/PS is easy to get into, but hard to actually get through!

First @ Rollaround – “since the rankings of both the University and the Program are not quite high.” Not sure what this is based on. One of the biggest strengths of IR/PS is that it located across the way from UCSD’s economics and pol sci programs, both of which are top 10 in country and most professors at IR/PS are also professors at these departments. The PhD program, however, is a bit of a weakness. My understanding is that you pretty much have to apply to the PhD in pol sci, be admitted there, get funding, etc through them. In your later years, you are then welcome to reach out to IR/PS professors and resources later in your PhD process. I do not think they are accepting anyone directly into the PhD program at IR/PS, but I could be wrong. I only know one person that graduated from the IR/PS phD program. She is pretty awesome though. She worked at the IABD for a while then moved to the German Marshall Fund. I think the academics at IR/PS are top-notch. It isn’t as well known as some other professional IR programs (SAIS, Tufts, etc.) but those schools tend to have professors who are ex-top officials in government, NGO-leaders, diplomats, etc so their lectures are all stuff you can learn listening to public radio and reading the economist. Academically, the only other IR schools which “compete” (well, are better than) IR/PS are Colombia’s SIPA and Harvard’s KSG (this is a quote from the Dean of the school, not me). I agree though. I’ve worked and interned around DC, and I’ve meet people from every other IR program. My take is that IR/PS as hard as, or harder, than most other IR programs. The program is very quantitative in general, but if you hate numbers, you can do your best to avoid it after the first year. Since you are considering a PhD, I’m assuming you don’t hate numbers. If you want quantitative, you can get as much as that as you can imagine at UCSD. My last quarter I took a “Quantitative Methods for Advance Analyst” which was taught by someone at the math department…it made my head spin. Not to mention, UCSD's econ department is known for being the best in the world at econometrics (well, used to be at least). The school is in San Diego…so that’s probably all I need to say about “culture.” I loved it. Great weather, wonderful beaches, relax professors, etc. The career services team is amazing! However, IR/PS doesn’t have the network other, older IR programs have. So, you can get a great job out of IR/PS and there are great alumni, but a good job is not going to fall into your lap, you have to work for it (i.e. lots of time e-mailing alumni, networking, polishing resume, doing cool projects while in school, etc). I’m a firm believe in “you get what you pay for.” IR/PS costs half as much (or less) than other programs. So, you have less debt leaving IR/PS, but you will have to work harder to find a job! Currently, I work with people from almost every other IR program and I’m glad my student loan payments are half the size!

eh. not totally sure yet. I plan to write an SOP that gets me into a school, not one that relates to my actual research interests, because I really want to take the first two years to flesh that out. all my research experience has been related to international trade. So, yea, pretty easy to come up with something that fits well within public policy.

I graduated from this program! Happy to answer any questions on it!!! I highly recommend it!

Sorry if this is the wrong forum for this, but there is no public policy forum for PhD I love the idea of doing a pol sci phd. Those programs sound a lot more interesting to me. However, I also care about institutions. I don’t need to go to Harvard but I also don’t want to do to Southeastern Texas State University, with zero employment prospects. When I apply to PhD programs I’ll be a little older, around 27-28. I also don’t have great GPAs (3.2 undergrad, 3.4 grad), but I have what is nowadays considered very good work experience. Two-years at a Big 4 accounting firms as a consultant and two-years (at time of application) at one of the best think-tanks in the world. I think this means I have a much better shot at admissions into a public policy program than a pol sci program, because they seem to value work experience more. Does anyone know if that assumption is correct? In other words, do experienced candidates have a better chance at public policy programs? Also, there seem to be a lot less public policy programs. Are these programs much more competitive? Again, sorry if this is the wrong forum, but I appreciate any insight.

My school is all based on a strict curve...it was a pain.

I think adcoms know that a 3.6 from a professional school is legit. Though, they will look closely at specific courses, so the ones that apply better be good.

Oh yea, take them if you can. I just assumed you didn't have the (1) time (2) money or (3) energy to take them while doing a masters. But if you can, go for it!

well, I would certainly listen to some with a PhD that has been on committee's over little ole me. I just wanted to encourage a fellow applicant to pursue their interests. Plus, since they are in a professional master's program, I knew what type of research they were talking about. I've heard the "you have to take all these classes before they will even consider you file" arguments a lot, so I wanted to avoid going down that road. I'm also from the "write the application that gets you in" school of thought. Which lends itself to taking all those classes after you get in, if you need them for what you are interested in.

I disagree that you need calculus, etc for admission. You could probably just say you want to take those courses during your first two years (assuming they do not list them as required...which I think caltech and GSB do). I discovered my love of methods during my master's as well

UCSD is totally the way to go. The pol sci department has close ties to IR/PS (which has a strong Asia focus with several very well-known scholars) and they are very quanty program. I did my master's at IR/PS. San Diego is a great place to be!!! Oh, and I've always heard never go to a program for one professor.

obviously. More applicants, less funding for state schools.

I think I can add a few more comments.... 1. Both require knowledge and training, however, to me it is the difference between art and science. In other words, training helps both, but there will be some people that are just naturally good at qual. While some people might have a disposition for quant work, you can never excel at it without lots of training (nobody just understands what a two-fixed effect model is?!?!?). In my opinion, it is much better to develop the quant skills, even if you want to do qual work, because you have to know how to critic the quant work of others, at the very least. Not to mention, pol sci (again my opinion) is undergoing a transistion that happened in economics around the 1920s. It is being quantified. Whether this is good or bad, I suppose, is debtable. 2. Yes. Life should be taken step by step. Getting in is all that matters. Again though, be open. I was a numbers person before my master's degree. Now, I have strong stata programming skills and I'm working on learning the R language....so be open! 3. what do you mean by foreign service people? If your goal is to join the foreign service, do not get a phd, get a masters (from a small subset of schools). I work at a think tank myself, as a researcher. I wouldn't say that think tanks are hostile to quant work. In general, think tank's research is not as rigorous and more agenda-driven, so they like to use numbers to support their claims, not as "truth-seekers" like academics. They might be a little bitter/jealous at times because academics are intellectually superior (in my opinion) but they are not hostile and certainly don't mind people with quant. skills (it is actually a big plus).

I disagree with the "problem dictates the methodology" point. The implication is that someone without proper econometric training would know what can and can't be anwsered with statistics seems silly. I TAed two quantative method classes which pol sci PhDs took. Across the board they all said that they wished they would have taken these courses early and been able to weave more into their research earlier on (they were usually 3rd and 4th years). They were mostly doing comparative though, so there is a bias. You really should be open to being a quant. person. I didn't take a single math class in my undergrad, but feel in love with quant. analysis during my masters, and I plan to continue to sharpen those skills when I do a PhD, and it is without a doubt better for job prospects. So, I think you should be very open to going to a quant school, because you never know. Data are taking over the world, people that know how to work with it will surely do better than those who don't. Regarding admissions, I have no idea how much they care. To be honest, for my sake, I'm hoping they care a lot about previous coursework. good luck.

I did a professional master's. If you can already get into a program you are interested in, I would say go straight to it. If you can't, it is a good option. I couldn't have gotten in anywhere before my masters. Now, I have strong quant/method skills and tons of research experience (I went to work for a think-tank after my masters). I plan on applying to a couple top ten schools in a few years, all of which I would have had zero chance with before. Don't know much about Pittsburg, I would worry a little about how much debt it is going to cost you, but besides that, I'm sure its a fine school.

Sounds like it. Are the programs in the same department/school? Some university only you apply to one program in the entire university, others only one program per department/school. More important question though is, you know how different those career paths are right? I mean, its cool to not be sure what you want to do, but realize the difference in those options!

I mean that that type of research is going to be done by economist, not pol sci. Grossman and Helpman are both economist. I'm not very familiar with formal theory literature, but I've never seen much pol sci research on trade theory or even trade more generally. I've seen interesting stuff from sociologist, but not pol sci. Maybe I'm just not familiar with it. Regardless, I would say the best signal is still going to be math courses. Have you taken a game theory course? If you know of pol sci departments with strong focuses on trade, I would love to hear about them! My background is in trade and I'm considering applying in a few years.

depends what you are trying to signal. If you want to signal your research interests, just take the class that is closest to it. If you want to signal that you can handle hard courses, take the hardest econmetrics courses you can take, or just take straight up math courses. I have a strong econ background. By mico theory do you mean like regular mico intro course? I do trade-related research, and I don't think there is much from micro that you would use in any type of trade research. Any type of firm level work is going to be pretty much straight econ territory.

So, I'm not super qualified to anwser. I haven't applied to a program yet, and I might not even do pol sci. Nonetheless, I find it hard to believe you don't have a shot at those schools. I plan to apply to higher ranked programs with much lower GPAs! What the story on the GRE? Looks a little low, could you improve it? Assuming if you write an intelligent SOP, I think you have a good shot! If you are just posting on here for a little moral support (which I often do), here goes: you are a shoe-in!

I'm off the opinion that you should write what will get you in, not what you actually want to research. Since what your thesis and research interests are so far off, though, you might be right though. Nonetheless, use it as a chance to show off. The second paragraph doesn't need to be chopped, but modified. It is fine to talk about how your interests developed, but again, in a way that sounds more professional and less personal.

A few thoughts, but before that, a full disclosure. I have never applied to a PhD and don't plan til probably 2013 (even then, it might not be sociology). I've also never taken a sociology class, and I just started considering sociology. In other words, feel free to completely ignore my comments. - Personally, I'm not a fan of the "grab your attention" style introduction you are going for. It isn't the type of language you see in research papers, so it doesn't help your case. To me, it comes across as unprofessional and immature, not as "this person really has a passion for sociology," which I believe is what you are going for. - The section on the research you want to do seems a little to specific. I would open it up to include several questions you want to work towards answering. These question should show that you are familiar with the current issues/questions being work towards in criminology and deviance literature. Also, I would suggest referring specific faculty in the department whose work interests you. - Your section on your thesis is vague. I know nothing about criminology, but if you substitute the name of the thesis, that paragraph could be talking about any thesis. What literature did you review? What theories did you apply? How much research funding did you receive? Also, most importantly, what where the main findings and conclusions on your thesis? Or, where did your thesis come up short that you would like to look further into. - You mention that you want to do quantitative analysis and that you were the TA for a stats course (stats is something I do know a lot about) but there is zero indication that you are familiar with stat techniques in this SOP. This could probably be addresses when you take about your thesis or by explaining what the course you TAed cover (e.g. descriptive statistics on cross sectional and time series data set from XYZ crime survey). Hope this helps! Again, I have no qualifications to give advice so....take it or leave it. Overall, it is really good!

Thanks! I'm just starting to dig into sociology reasearch. I read somewhere else that economic sociology is really just the sociology of work. Seems like that might have been the traditional line, but recently economic sociology is starting to branch out more. For example, I'm really interested in international trade. Economics has pretty much had the same position on trade for the past 100 years (which a few changes here and there). I'm interested in how trade effects communities on a more hollastic level than econ usually looks at (i.e. prices and wages). I'm more intereste in impact on crime, inequality, culture, religion, etc. Any thoughts? Am I barking up the correct tree? Decaf- Are you referring to the econ soc from the sloan school? I don't think I have the background to get into sloan. Although I do work with a professor from there!

Does anyone know how hard it is to fill out each letter? Esp since everything is electronic now. I'm in the very early process of considering schools. I'm not a traditional candidate so I want to apply to a good amount of schools (probably about 10 or so). I have professors that know me and like me that would be willing to write good letters. However, I'm hesitant to ask them to fill out 10 letters each (that would take forever!). If it is a simple cut and paste ten times though, no problem. Since I have four-five professors I could ask, do I need to divide up who writes which letter to which school based off matching backgrounds? Thanks!