zourah

Congratulations - and welcome, I hope - to the new admits! I'm happy to tell any and all of you why you should come to the K school, or answer any other questions I'm qualified to address. (note: no PMs, please).

Last year I applied MSFS and the Georgetown letter was almost the last one to arrive - no email, just a paper letter in the mail in late March (possibly the day before the K-school emails?) Anyway, responses on the forums appeared in one big wave as the postal service deliveries moved outward from DC, so I'm pretty confident notifications all go out more-or-less at once.

Not speaking about SIPA specifically, usually you stay on the wait list either until you're admitted, you remove your name because you're not willing to wait any more, or it gets to be early August. Generally, schools won't make that final round of apologetic emails until they're absolutely certain they've got their fall class squared away, which will be late summer.

If I recall from last year, decisions are released by program - the MPAs heard on a different day from the MPPs. As for the school more generally, I love it. I'm not getting any aid, but many others are. It's the one big unknown for everyone on the board - financial decisions come out some time after admissions decisions, so there's another limbo period where the admits all wonder if they'll be able to afford it or not. As for the girls, I'm partial to here. One of my roommates who goes to HBS definitely tries to meet HKS girls when possible, so I think we've got a pretty good reputation... Try not to stress; decisions will come when they come.

I don't know about the relative admission statistics for the two programs. Are you also asking about the curriculum and students in each? If not, ignore my next paragraph. MPA/ID is very focused - its core is quant-heavy (they joke about completing the work for a PhD in econ without receiving the degree), and those courses take up the entirety of the first year. The MPP offers a variety of concentrations, allowing some students to follow a similar program, but many others take a good deal less econ and stats (and get some electives first year). If you've already got a strong econ background and want to do development work, go for the MPA/ID - it's a rigorous, well-respected program in that field. If you want to do anything else (or aren't already well-versed in math), the MPP is a more flexible program. Mid- to late-March is traditionally when decisions are released. Trust me, you'll know almost instantly - the forums here fill with posts as soon as the email goes out.

No worries. The list was so long it seemed easy to have missed them - apologies for the confusion.

Both JHU MPP and SAIS are listed. What Hopkins is missing?

Wow. I'm sorry you have such a disorganized recommender. Still, this one person can't single-handedly kill your applications - you have every right to be upset, but here's hoping you still get the letters you want come March.

I really wouldn't worry too much. My closest mentor/boss/friend was more than happy to write for me last year, but was unfamiliar with the traditions and styles. Even having helped him polish the language a bit, it came off as a bit reserved rather than completely glowing - something of a cultural difference, I suppose. Anyway, I worried about it a good deal (this is the person who knows me best, who supervises my work; what are they going to think of this?!?) and in the end it just didn't hurt me. So long as what he said is positive, I don't think the ad coms really spend lots of time reading between the lines for additional indicators.

Last year's official date was in early April as well. They do usually beat their own deadline by a week or so, but always grant themselves the right to send letters quite late.

The World Bank and IMF are actually part of the larger UN system - I'd cluster all those under the heading of inter-governmental orgs more generally.

Actually, many joint-degree students do the MPP as well. I don't have figures as to how many there are in each category, but because most of the MPA candidates already possess one advanced degree, anyone applying for both simultaneously is likely to end up MPP instead.

Well, PAL is now DPI, and this year quite a few more people exempted, though the American government option still managed a pretty ridiculous curve.

I'd like to add as neutral a comment as possible to this conversation... First, my perspective. Like the OP, I applied to grad school straight out of undergrad with good grades, good GREs, and only minimal WE. I had majored in French, minored in Spanish, and had a year of Arabic under my belt. I got rejected by HKS, Fletcher, and Georgetown MSFS. I was accepted at GW-Elliot. I worked two years and reapplied, and am now very, very happy at HKS. So, to the OP - you'll get in somewhere if you want to go straight to grad school now. This board is filled with worries right now and it's completely understandable, but don't panic. That said, there is definitely some value to the advice to take some time, work a bit, and then apply. I wasn't at all happy to receive rejections, but I'm absolutely confident that I did the right thing in turning down GW and trying again. I can't say with any certainty that the same thing will happen to you, but if it does, I hope that you will weigh your options knowing that a year or two of life experience could unlock any doors that remain closed as of this application season. Then again, I wish you the best of luck this spring!

They always say April. You can call and ask, but the decision will come when the admissions folks are ready. I sincerely doubt anything you do will change when they release it.

I definitely didn't modify my basic policy statement to include much of the "concern to me" part. Then again, some discussion of my interest in the topic appeared in my SOP already... but nonetheless, I wouldn't worry about it.

I wrote about the then-popular talk of a "League of Democracies" and the things it could possibly accomplish (while spelling out the reasons why its backers were incorrect to believe it could rival the UN/lend legitimacy to their pet policy wishes, etc.) It let me play with counterfactual diplomatic negotiations and look seriously at world power alliances.

Don't start talking like that until it's actually over - the EN accepts are going to be a ridiculously strong pool, but you still have a chance come spring. No defeatism allowed this early in the game.

I'm an MPP - I had a minimal quant background, so my qualifications were simply not suited to MPA/ID. I contributed to the "final decisions" thread last year, which is a valuable resource for looking at who got in where, and who chose which schools. I'm decidedly not an expert at admissions - I genuinely feel that getting in this time (I was rejected two years previously) had to do with finally finding a clear way to communicate my interest in international political affairs in a way that was both passionate and sincere...and I'm sure if I re-read my SOPs today, I'd think they were terrible. Anyway, I'm not still around the grad cafe to rate people's chances or to offer the secret to admissions success, as I would fail you terribly at both. I did want to make myself available to answer any questions I can and to offer moral support - this forum kept me from going crazy while waiting for decisions last spring, so I'll be here as good company to those going through the process again. I'd say to consider primarily your abilities in econ and stats when deciding between doing MPA/ID and MPP with an IGA concentration and then trust in your instincts. Good luck!

Generally, if you're only a year or two out of university, two should be from your school years and one from your post-school years. If you've been out longer, or feel your non-academic work should receive greater consideration, you can use one academic and two professional.

You don't mention where you're applying, but if you're looking at the handful of top programs most talked about here, you'll want a particularly articulate SOP laying out what you want to do and why you're ready to take on a Masters a few years before most of your peers. Go for it - I have classmates this year straight out of undergrad, and they're pretty impressively accomplished folks - but know that it will be your story, and not your stats, that will help most. (I say that as a stats-blessed applicant who DIDN'T have a particularly clear life plan and wasn't accepted straight out of undergrad but rather in a second round two years later.)

That's how I discovered the grad cafe last spring - looking for new ways to distract myself from thinking about a process completely in others' hands. Welcome - the wait will be agonizing, but there'll be good company here! Last spring, linden posted a parody of a WWS applicant that made a lot of people feel better about how intimidating those bios look:

I also ended up going with #1 so as to give myself a break from the "brag about yourself" feeling I was suffering writing SOPs. I went completely off-course and gave them a brief glimpse into my extreme bookishness, from the relevant (history, current events) to the completely unrelated (fiction, more fiction, my childhood plans to become a novelist). I felt like it gave them a better idea of who I was and what perspective I would come in with than an attempt at explaining exactly when I fell in love with the idea of traveling the world and how I tamed that wanderlust into something resembling a career plan. I hope that your rewrites on #3 are going well, but if not, consider taking a different tack entirely. This is one essay where you can, in fact, have a little more fun.