NadirLineage

I read recently about Northeastern University's "Sport in Society Center." It's not exactly IR related, but I thought you might be interested. http://www.northeastern.edu/sportinsoci ... index.html There's also an article that incorporates that office and Obama's recent formation of the "Office of Olympic, Paralympic and Youth Sport." http://www.northeastern.edu/news/storie ... ciety.html

africagirl, One thing that I am trying to get a jump on is housing and jobs/internships. I don't live in the area, so I will need to be moving down to DC sometime this summer. From what I've found, most apartment complexes have a 60 day notice policy. I'm thinking of doing an August 1st move-in date, so that would mean that I start looking in earnest at the end of May/beginning of June for a place to live. Hearing from other's past experience or advice here could be useful. I've also been keeping an eye out for any job openings in the area, and have applied to one already. As for internships, I find almost all that begin in the Fall have a application deadline of July 15, so we have some time there. Just thought this info might be helpful.

I'll be heading to the Elliott school this Fall as well, and have had a similar experience. I sent in my deposit fairly close to the deadline (about a week prior) and I haven't even been told it was received, so consider yourself lucky on that front. Regarding financial aid, if you read their website and the information packet that first went out to you, they have the directions that you mentioned. You basically have to fill out a loan request form, choose a lender, and request your amount. The priority deadline was May 1st, so hopefully you've done that. I've been offered $0 in terms of fellowships, so I just requested the full amount of tuition and expenses in way of loans. $20,500 is the max you can request for the Stafford loan, and I asked for another $20,000 in Graduate PLUS loans. Neither have been formally approved yet, and I haven't heard a peep from GW since their reminder to send in deposits. I'm basically taking them on faith right now, and assume my deposit has been received and my financial aid info is being processed. I did attend the Accepted Student day, and I think I heard someone say that we'll be getting another info packed towards the end of May with the information that you were talking about (how much in loans we're approved for, and probably some info on what we should do next). I'm having cold feet after requesting over $40,000 in loans anyways, so if for some reason everything falls through and they never received my deposit, it might be a blessing in disguise. PS - Oh, I wanted to add one caveat from admitted student day that was a bit of a surprise for me. Someone in the crowd asked "If we weren't offered a fellowship this year, is it possible for us to receive one during our second year?" To which Mr. Miles replied, "I'm going to be honest with you. It is very unlikely you'll be offered a fellowship if you were not offered one already." I appreciate his honesty, but I was surprised. That's a pretty different policy than, say, Columbia which states that "10% of 1st year students receive a fellowship, but 70% of second year students end up getting some sort of financial aid." **I looked at my bank account after posting this, and GW just cashed the check I sent them. The cold feet is rapidly becoming paralysis as the prospect of debt becomes increasingly real.**

Previous Schools (Name, type, or tier): Private University, Top 100 (but on the low end) Previous Degrees and GPA's: B.A. in International Relations, 3.6 GPA GRE Scores (Verbal/Quantitative/Analytical Writing): 610/700/5.0 Previous Work Experience (Years, Type): 1 year abroad after graduation which was a mix of study and work. State Dept internship. UNDP internship. 1 year working at the Alma Mater in a position completely unrelated to IR. Math/Econ Background: Took calculus in college, got an A. Micro and Macro with mediocre grades. Two Econ electives with A's in both. Foreign Language Background: Mandarin (lived for 2 years in China) Intended Field of Study in Grad School: International Relations with a concentration in East Asia Long Term Professional Goals: Public sector (State Dept or other) or think tank. Schools Applied to & Results: UC San Diego - IR/PS (accepted, no funding), George Washington - Elliott (accepted, no funding), Columbia - SIPA (rejected), Tufts - Fletcher (rejected), Johns Hopkins - SAIS (waitlisted) Ultimate Decision & Why: Will attend GW over San Diego, mainly for the location, unless I'm admitted to SAIS off the wait-list.

Also rejected after all of that... Thanks Columbia!

Where else have you applied WishinHopin? And could you share your stats? I'm basically hoping for a waitlist at this point. I seriously doubt I'm in that category of people they're considering for funding.

Yeah, I agree. It must be some 20 some odd people. Did anyone in this 3% group have a problem submitting their application? Mine was listed as incomplete up until early February, despite having submitted everything on time (I had to re-submit my essay for some reason). I have a sneaking suspicion that this is the reason that I'm still waiting.

Yes, all annoyance about the long wait will be forgiven if it's good news in the end...

"97% of admission decisions have been sent out and for those of you who have yet to hear, we appreciate your patience as we wrap up the final few details." Taken from the SIPA admissions blog (http://rtl.lamp.columbia.edu/sites/sipa/). I'm in that lucky 3%. FML.

Nothing. Seriously, I think it's just you and I left.... Fucking ridiculous.

If it's anything like last year, they're emailing the admits and snail mailing all the rejects and waitlists. Ah well. Another year, another disappointment.

Haha... I'll be super pissed too if I get a waitlist notification. I've been opening up my rejection notification from last year as practice for what's to come.

Yeah, tonight will definitely involve a celebration or an attempt to erase the memory of the past two weeks from my mind. Either way, excessive amounts of drinking will be involved.

I'm confident they'll send out the rest of the decisions today. Looks like some are already starting to trickle out again. Let the madness continue!

You are not alone my friend.

If the Admissions office at SIPA is anything like the office I'm at now, they're probably not bothering with processing decisions and are instead spending their time looking at pictures of lolcats. And we wonder why there's a recession?

I heard that they have a way to track the number of times an individual logs into the application website to check for a decision, and the remaining 20% of decisions will be based on that number. The admissions committee is using it as a sign of "how bad we want it." But you have to be careful and not check too often, because there's a specific number (I won't say what) that is a sign of mental instability, and that will definitely result in a rejection. So... try to find the middle path.

I'm willing to bet that the only people still waiting are admits with funding and rejects, and that I'm in the latter group. Sadface. It'd be a bad bet to make though, so I won't do it.

Columbia might be trickling more decisions out today... (http://www.thegradcafe.com/survey/index ... &t=t&pp=25) Not that I've heard anything though. Man, I could use some good news right now too...

I've pretty much resigned myself to a rejection at this point, and the idea that the delay is due to the fact that they're considering me for a fellowship is laughable (in my case anyway...). Hope I'm wrong.