sassywalrus

First of all, I have nothing but positive things to say about the OP, that's awesome!! But I think it's important to know that for those entering HGSE (or any other school), you are not guaranteed a six figure job when you get out. Sure we all hope for it, but please be realistic and definitely don't bank on it happening. My opinion (with numbers!): I paid for my grad degree with my entire salary for two years, but I have ~$90k debt from undergrad. I think it's important to have some concrete numbers for others to see, especially after reading the comment about making $50k and thinking you'll have $50k. From my experience, you take home about 70% of your salary after taxes, insurance, retirement, etc are all taken out. I make $44k/year, which I think is on par with a lot of education jobs. My paychecks are $1,250 and I get 24 of them a year (take home pay = $30k/yr). So each month you have $2,500. Student loan payments tend to be 1% of the total per month, so $100k in loans = $1k payment per month. You're down to $1,500. If you live in any city in the northeast your rent will most likely be anywhere from $700-$1200. Now you have $800 or $300 left. On average, you'll spend $50/week on food ($200/month). Now you're down to $600 or $100. Do you have a cell phone? That's another ~$50/month. Do you like heat and hot water and other utilities? Another $100/month. Down to $500 and $0. Uh oh. It's doable if everything you pick is at the low end of the spectrum, but don't think "oh $1k a month is easy to give up" when you make ~$50k/yr. Also keep in mind this goes on for 15 years, unless you get a big pay bump. Everyone's situation is a little bit different but I think it's important to put a real budget out there for people to see just to get a feel for what your life might look like post graduation. Basically with that amount of debt, it's like paying another rent payment on top of your normal rent payment per month. Also I deferred by loans while I was in school for 2 years and it added $10k in interest, so keep that in mind if you ever need to defer. Also to the person with the working in Asia comment, I laughed at that because I assumed you were referring to the barrage of emails we Ivy students get every week that say "come work in Asia!!!".

I don't know if this helps but I pretty much had the same train of thought you did. I went from looking at stat programs, to applied statistics, to statistics programs within schools of education (TC in your case). I'll be attending Penn GSE for the MS SMART degree in the fall. While I work in education (kind of stumbled into it), my undergrad degree is in economics and my broad interest is survey design & analysis / data analysis in general. I don't think employers will really care if your degree is from a school of education, the coursework is pretty much the same.

You already made your decision but I'll chime in anyway. I went to Maryland for undergrad and it really is an amazing school and it gets better every year. If your concern is that you won't be in DC like you would at Georgetown, don't worry, Maryland has it's own Metro station and buses and you can be there really quickly. College Park is a fun town, good luck and congratulations!

MS in Statistics, Measurement, Assessment and Research Technology. How am I going to put that on a resume?

I work in IR, basically state reporting for a college (aka no student interaction). I have no experience or direct interest in K-12. I'm going to Penn in the fall for Statistics, Measurement, Assessment and Research Technology.

UPenn MS SMART

From my experience as someone who works at a college, a PhD in English would be fine to work in administration. Most of the time when a PhD is required for a job in administration, they seem to mean a PhD in nearly anything. I don't think a PhD in Education would really be beneficial in terms of cost, time, etc. Especially if it's just for something that might not even happen.

I'm actually working full time and will do the program part time and take 2 years to finish (2 classes for 4 semesters instead of 4 classes for 2 semesters).

Well it's been 2 months since I was accepted but I've definitely read it a few times haha. I wish they mailed us an actual letter, I'd probably frame it. Finances are tough, I didn't get any scholarships and I don't want to take out loans so I'm just paying full price. Our day is just one day on the 28th.

Hooray for someone else in SMART!

I applied to a different program (M.S. SMART) but since it's in the GSE and also has rolling admissions I'll add my two cents: I applied a little before Thanksgiving, got an email on December 4 that said my application was being sent for faculty review, and I received an email January 8 saying a decision had been made (had to log in, acceptance letter link on the bottom). The acceptance letter was actually dated January 7, I spent a whole day not knowing I had gotten in!

I was recently accepted (a miracle!) to the SMART program at UPenn for the fall. I've already accepted since it was my top choice but I was wondering if anyone has come across any external information about this degree/program. While the Penn website has a lot of information, I can't seem to find anything else about it. I can't even seem to find anyone who has graduated from the program. It seems as though the entire Quantitative Methods department is pretty small. I was just curious what students of the program thought about it and what most of them go on to do after they graduate (PhD, work, consulting, etc)?

Blazer - HAHA at that Mia Hamm comment Patient - Thanks so much for your input, someone else who understands insane amounts of undergrad debt! I was thinking about this finance-wise and I don't know if I should wait to apply for fall 2014 (seems so far away!). I work nearly full time and live at home so by then I will have significantly paid down my outstanding student debt and have a ton of work/conference experience, so maybe that will equal scholarship money? I just don't know!

I already did that. They both were really nice and said "I look forward to receiving your application and having you join us in the fall!" So who knows if it really is that easy to get into these programs due to little interest from applicants. I'll try to pester some students in the fall to see what their GPAs, GRE scores, etc were.

Yup! Well good luck to you and thanks for the info!! Now if only any of the 20 people in these programs would weigh in on their experience anywhere on the internet...

Those are all great schools, I love UPenn. Rutgers is my state school but I opted to go out of state for undergrad and owe a small fortune in student loans. Where I went to undergrad is always a common topic in job interviews ("oh what a beautiful campus!!", "isn't your mascot a turtle?", etc.) and I feel like going to Rutgers employers will just be like "oh another Rutgers person *yawn*". Haha. I know employers have brought me in just because of my interesting resume, and I feel like Miami will continue the trend. Plus I already work in Institutional Research at a college and a lot of the reports and stuff I see are based out of the Florida/Miami area. But Rutgers would be soooo inexpensive.

In my mind I like the Miami program better, despite the fact that I'm partial to cold weather. I worked out the percentages (quickly, and rounded, so forgive any errors) and it seems like they are dead even. #7 works out to 10-11 students and #8 works out to 3 faculty for both. I went to an ACC school for undergrad and loved it, maybe I subconciously think it will be similar and that's why I'm partial to Miami. Plus I feel like I might do better at a smaller school, despite the program size being the same.

Thanks so much! They seem pretty even, give or take a few factors. I don't know if the 1%/4% implies no one applies for these programs and I'll have a better shot at getting in That Rutgers in-state tuition is mighty appealing.

Hi Everyone! I'm deciding where to apply (either Fall 2013 or 2014) and I have found programs that line up with my professional goals at both Rutgers and University of Miami. I haven't found many reviews or anything about both Schools of Education so I was wondering of anyone on here goes/went here, or knows someone who does/did. The websites don't give much information in terms of class size or student profile. Really any information would be helpful: professors, general attitude of students, financial aid, etc. If it helps I'm looking at Educational Statistics, Measurement & Evaluation at Rutgers and Research, Measurement & Evaluation at Miami. Thanks!

*2 months later* Agreed with the computer bit, a lot of the programs I have looked at seem to imply you could have a BA in basketweaving and still get in (in terms of math knowledge). This leads me to believe I would have an advantage if I actually get into a program since everything would be more of a review, or at least build upon things I already know. I think the Miami program appeals to me the most since they seemed to emphasize learning new computer skills and holding most of their classes in computer labs. After being in the workplace I know those skills are definitely what IR departments love.

@Dizzi - Thanks for the input. I agree about the actual skills. With my Economics degree I learned STATA pretty well, and I've always been an advanced Excel user. Sometimes I think the current age/technology gap between employer and potential employee is too great. For example, I'm young enough to have used Excel/Word/PowerPoint/Internet regularly since Middle School, so using those programs is like second nature to me; some employers ask for specific examples and times where I have learned certain basic skills and it's hard for me to convey I have pretty much known how to use these programs for my entire life. Or maybe I just have a hard time explaining myself in interviews (that would explain why it took me so long to find a job...). I picked up SPSS and Business Objects in a few days at my current position. I love learning new computer programs and statistical packages. I see what you're saying about the different types of methods used in different fields. I think I might have to spend more time really focusing on the career I would like and matching the needs of the career to a grad program. I think graduating into the horrible job market in 2010 has made me terrified of focusing on one specific career though, just in case things don't get better and I need to change career paths. @ZeChocMoose - I'm not sure. Econometrics programs seem really internesting but don't seem to be as plentiful as regular Economics programs, but again I need to do more research on what's out there. One of the reasons the RME program seemed so appealing was that it doesn't require any additional undergrad courses. Like you said, to even apply to a lot of the stat programs I've looked at I would need to take about 5 additional classes (Calc II & III, Linear Algebra, etc) before I could even apply. In terms of part time vs full time, it depends. I live in an area with A LOT of colleges and universities so if I find something around here I would probably do it part time and try to have my employer pay for it. If I found a program that seemed really great that I would have to move to, I would be willing to take a year off to complete it. In terms of time, I would rather have a masters in 2-3 semesters of full time study than spread it out over 3-5 years. I should also mention that the job I have now is not definite. I was hired in January to fill a vacancy until the summer, and it is possible my position will end soon. Since I like working in IR though and most departments require/desire an advanced degree I feel like maybe an RME degree could be the way to go to stay in the field.

Thanks for the advice! Nice to see someone else who worked in IR. Agreed about the applied statistics. I have a B.A. in Economics where I focused mainly in statistics/econometrics, but most people think of finance (aside from 2 intro classes we pretty much never focused on money in any of my courses) when they see my degree, so I would like a masters that will signal to employers that I know how to do statistics. Plus I like statistics and would like to learn more. I'm a little skeptical of getting an M.Ed. because I don't want to pigeonhole myself into IR, my original goal was to do market research, the skillset is the same. I feel like the UMiami degree is applied statistics in disguise because all of the courses seem like straight statistics and in the FAQ they basically say with this degree you can go into data analysis or market research in any field in the private and public sector. I like working with surveys and focus groups too so I definitely need to do some digging for programs that would help me.

Hi Everyone! I couldn't find a thread talking about M.S.Ed. or Ph.D. programs pertaining to those who would like to work in institutional research. I currently work in institutional research and love it, but I'm coming to the realization I'll need a master's in something (it really can be in anything) to advance my career in the field. I would obviously like a degree in something that would help me in my everyday life at work so I was thinking statistics, but then I found the Research, Measurement, and Evaluation degree from the University of Miami and that got me thinking about getting a degree from a School of Education. I found a few other schools that have similar degrees (UCLA, UPenn) and it seems like a perfect combination of statistics and applied research. I was wondering if anyone is in or knows anyone in any of these programs? Do you/they like it? Most Education forums/threads are mostly geared toward teaching or other programs so any insight would be greatly appreciated!