kbui
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Everything posted by kbui
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I wonder what is going on. I'm starting to really think that they decided to forgo the entire survey and just give us one email in April.
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I thought you were serious. I almost had a heart attack from joy.
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Maybe they're forgoing it all together.
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My personal belief is that you should not go into debt unless you are almost certain that you can pay it off with a certainty value of income (so the minimum you know, not think, you will get), and if you are comfortable with the actual amount of debt that you will be paying off. I use this student debt estimator to get a more realistic sense of what I will be paying and how much each month I will need to partition out. Some schools actually pay their students' tuition (Princeton WWS) and some schools help you with student loan payments (HKS and Fletcher), and so there are some other resources that is available. I would say that not only would a fellowship help relieve some of the debt, you get connected to a more tight-knit network that is worth more than the actual amount. In addition, the teaching assistants/teaching fellows get a very strong connection to the professor they're doing it for, and so that's worth something also in addition to the financial benefits. Overall, I would wipe the glitter and haze of "prestige" from the institution and see if the course curriculum and network is worth it for you. Proximity to power is higher at a prestigious school, but do you want that to be more than 40 percent of your decision? It very well may be, and we all have different preferences, so there's nothing wrong with taking social "prestige" and status over paying debt for decades--it just doesn't pass the cost-analysis benefit test for some people. Good luck though. If you're in a minority group of some kind, use it to your advantage. You'd be surprised at what admissions and fellowship committees are looking for.
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I wonder when the budget update email is going to come. Or has it been sent already?
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I find myself thinking about the Boren every day. Do people have the same experience?
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What a shame that they're no longer doing that. From the past forums, it seems like too many people were emailing the Boren staff and knew that we caught on to their informal finalist notification system. We should be expecting something in the upcoming weeks.
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Reading through her blog, she definitely made the most out of her fellowship and fully deserved it. Referring back to my past experience with Boren in Taiwan, I didn't know of all the activities and competitions that I would've been a part of if I wasn't there in the first place. Two essays can only give us so much space to write about what we think we want to do, and that can be vastly different than what happens in the country. I was talking to three Boren Fellow alums, and all three of them changed their plans as soon as they arrived because the circumstances couldn't support what they thought they wanted to do. At least Boren is really flexible when it comes to changing programs as long as they're still language focused.
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To respond to someone's question earlier, I found some Boren Fellowship essays that may be of interest. http://fulfillingthepurpose.blogspot.com/search/label/Boren
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That's a great observation. I haven't really thought about that, though from the 2016 recipients, I didn't see anyone studying in Russia and so people may already be very well aware that it's not an option, or maybe people apply for it but then will have to choose an alternate program. I would love to learn Russian if given the chance. My previous piano teacher was Russian and I loved the sound of it when she spoke.
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I'm trying to dig into the DoD budget to see if there is an increase this year for NSEP funding, specifically Boren funding, but from the reports I haven't been able to find anything worth mentioning.
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Thai is not a very popular language to learn, but it is one of the more competitive locations for Fulbright ETAs. It might be that there are a lot of applications for Thailand but because it's not as urgent for the U.S. as Chinese, Arabic, or Russian are, Boren might just give less priority for it. I'm overanalyzing all of this for sure.
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I do hope that fewer people applied in response to the new administration for our sake, but at the same time, we need more talented people to continue entering the government--and so I have mixed feeling about that. I was talking to some alums and they told me that since I'm not applying for one of the major languages that I may have a higher chance, though I'm not totally convinced yet and don't want to get my hopes up.
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I know right? If they had kept it the way it was, if we didn't get the budget update at least we can just relax and find other opportunities and have more time to go through the seven stages of grief.
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I thought that the acceptance rate would be lower, actually, since in 2014 it was around 21.3%. I've been thinking about the possibility of getting this amazing opportunity to go back to Thailand throughout the day, and I can't wait until April/May to know. The wait is killing me! https://www.borenawards.org/sites/default/files/boren_fellowship_summary_stats_42.pdf
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I found a Google Sheet on the Boren for 2015-16 and made another copy (the old one was deleted by the creator) that will give us an approximate notification time for this year. https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1mmvm990nOB1j9Q3uuJ8Bl4Kb4d5iAGdF3wC_xg6xo6c/edit?usp=sharing
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Sounds like everyone is pretty confident. We now just play the waiting game. Fortunately, this graduate school program will keep me busy until we at least hear back about budget updates.
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How have potential recommenders rejected you?
kbui replied to Chumado's topic in Letters of Recommendation
When I was in my first semester of undergrad, I asked my biology professor to write me a recommendation letter for this student research program, in person. She came out and directly told me, "I can write you a letter, but it will not be very good." I was devastated. Now looking back at it, it wasn't that big a deal. But I learned my lesson and since then have only asked professors that have known me well to be letter writers. -
I had the same problem @SwissMister. I went from 1,200 words to 700, then back to 800, and I felt like I lost such an important part of my essay. I edited out an entire story that introduced why I was interested in public health, but it was probably for the better because 3/3 people told me to shorten/take it out--but somehow, a little voice inside me told me to keep it. I ended up writing more about why Thailand is important for U.S. national security and how this is the right time for a Boren in my education. I talked about how it's almost impossible to learn Thai back in Minnesota or here at my graduate school, and the highest level they offer is intermediate. I was a part of a small fellowship admissions committee and was able to read approximately 20 applications from first and second year undergraduate students. One of the biggest things that made their essays less captivating and interesting to read was when they tried to impress me, putting in research data without telling me why these particular issues motivated them to solve it. I was really looking for a personal statement, something to tell me about their lives and what challenges they had to overcome to be here. In the fellowship essay I really tried to tell the committee a little bit about myself and my upbringing before going into the national security argument. I hope the committee appreciates that. And @UnawareInGeneral I'm applying for Thailand for the fellowship. I was talking about when I was applying for a scholarship to Taiwan and had to get a language evaluation. At that point my Chinese was terrible, and I'm not even sure what my Chinese teacher wrote in my letter because I rarely spoke Chinese to him. Seems like both of you are in your second year of graduate school. That may work in your favor since this is the only year that you can receive it. But I hope that doesn't work in my disfavor... haha.
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The only essays I have are from previous fellows who I contacted during the process and who were kind enough to send me theirs. As for ones online, I haven't found any really. I do have one posted on my Boren blog that may help, but that was for a scholarship. What did you write were your plans for federal service? That is one thing that they need to know explicitly, so I made sure to put that in early.
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Overall, I feel like my application was strong enough. Though I'm having doubts because I didn't have anyone edit my second essay, and I don't actually know how effective it was. I'm not going to worry about it at the moment, though I just got rejected from another program that I applied to a couple weeks ago. I think there's just nothing else I can do at the moment for my application, except pray. Haha. Judging from your responses on here, it seems like you are very passionate about the language and have a great argument for why you should get the Boren. I'm sure they'll see the work that you've put in it and that you'll have a high chance of success. Especially because Bahasa is becoming a more important language as the U.S. reconsider our political position in the Asia Pacific.
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Though I would say that when I was applying for the Boren Scholarship, my language evaluation for Chinese must've been terrible because I did not have a strong grasp on the language, so Boren may be more understanding if it's a less commonly taught language (and that definitely includes Bahasa).
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Hi @SwissMister, congratulations on submitting an application! I think it was a really intensive process and we get to learn a lot about the country that we're applying to when preparing and writing, so either way it will be a rewarding experience. (Hopefully we'll get to carry out those plans in the actual country!) And I'll answer what I think/know about the process: I don't believe that the on-campus deadline or the committee evaluation plays a large role in the process. I do assume that the form that the evaluators use are similar to what the Boren committees will be using to judge the applicants, and so it may've helped to have your home school ask you questions to clarify your purpose and intentions before actually submitting. With that, if you've answered all of the questions clearly in your essays, you'll be fine. I think that my language evaluation was one of the most valuable part of my application because Thai is a very difficult language to learn, and so having someone comment on my progress and achievement in the language was key for me to separate myself from other applicants. I am not sure how the committee will weigh the letter, though because the purpose of the Boren is to increase America's language capacity, I would assume that it is a heavy factor when considering prospective fellows. During one of the webinars I asked something along the line of "Can disadvantaged students write about their background in the essay?," and they said as long as you answer the questions in the essay then yes. I would imagine they want to have as much "diversity" as possible, and that some groups are given more of a chance than others (e.g. East Asian Americans may not have special considerations automatically but Native Americans would). This is all just speculation though. How was your experience preparing for the application? What are your feelings now, now that you've submitted it?
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They did have an "update your budget" email that they will send out sometime in the next couple months, though GradCafers found out that it was an indirect "finalist" email, and we think that because so many email recievers contacted them about it that now they do it ubiquitously so that we don't know where we are in the process until the notification date.
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This is what the website said for the 2011 cycle so I'm assuming it's somewhat similar for subsequent years/this year. "All Boren applications are reviewed in a two-tiered process. This month, the applications are reviewed preliminarily based on world region. Each regional merit panel recommends a set number of applications to be reviewed by the national nominating panel. In mid-late April, the national nominating panels for the Boren Fellowships and the Boren Scholarships will meet to review the results of the regional panels and make final recommendations. IIE will send out notification letters to all applicants during the first week of May."
