Azrou

The initial offer was 7.5k yearly, was increased to 12.5k.

I got several generic open house emails mentioning that another round of funding decisions would be made soon. A couple of days ago I got another email saying that my award offer had been increased. I'm really happy about that and it looks like I will be going to GPPI.

Maybe I am misinformed but I think that compared to the vast majority of NGO/public/private jobs available coming out of an IR program, a FSO is much better equipped to handle high loan payments. You either have free housing or an additional housing allowance - no mortgage or rent. The cost of living is almost always much cheaper than in the US. You may not need/have a car, so no car payments, insurance, gas, etc. I'm sure you could find things to spend money on, but realistically speaking, your income after necessary expenses will be significantly higher than if you were at a run-of-the-mill federal position in DC. But it also goes without saying that an FSO position is not something you can count on and it may take several tries even for the most dedicated people.

Craigslist and Autotrader.com are good places to look. You can also just check out your newspaper's classifieds since you don't care what model you get. http://www.edmunds.com/used-cars/ will give you a lot of info once you have a candidate. You can check on its blue book value to see if they are asking a fair price. For example it tells me that a 2000 Honda Accord sedan with 120k miles sells for about $3000 in DC from a private party. Edmunds is the most reliable blue book IMO (compared to NADA and Kelley). One thing to keep in mind is that the small, lesser-known used car lots are basically like private sellers. They aren't going to offer any warranty, purchase protection, etc and aren't concerned about protecting their reputation as much as a large dealer would be. A recent model year (within the last 5) may be certified by a large dealer. Never purchase a car without getting it inspected by a mechanic. The cost for that can be anywhere from $100+ (from a dealer) to free (look up reputable mechanics in your area who specialize in that make of car and call them to ask how much they charge). Just remember than when buying any used car, especially one that is 10+ years old, it is always going to have some problems. Good luck!

Mediocre and just good? Your GRE scores are in the high 90's percentiles. That puts you way above the vast majority of people who take the test, and indeed, the vast majority of people on this forum. I've heard that many IR/policy schools take a close look at the Q score in particular to get a sense of how applicants will be able to handle the econ and stats portions of the curriculum, and you'll see many profiles with scores in the 70-80 percentile got into top schools with $$. I don't know anything about the GMAT but Google tells me a 710 is 92nd percentile. I would say that places you squarely out of the "dithering idiot" range.

I don't think there is any comprehensive list. However you can find a lot of the numbers you are looking for by just going to each school's website, and clicking on the admissions FAQ. Most will list the median V/Q GRE scores of their last matriculating class. You can also get some info from Peterson's which has the # of applicants and the acceptance rates for many schools. Ex: http://www.petersons.com/graduate-schools/tufts-university-fletcher-school-of-law-and-diplomacy-admissions-000_10014227_10099.aspx

Here are some things to think about. 1) As you said, top schools only admit a small % of applicants straight out of undergrad. Your chances of financial aid are going to be even less than that. Are you willing to pay full sticker price? 2) "Keeping academic momentum going" is not that great of a reason, IMO. You won't lose any of the skills you learn in undergrad, in fact, they will only become stronger as you mature. You may find that taking some time off to get professional experience will allow you to approach a master's program down the road refreshed and more prepared. 3) Finding the ideal job with a 4 year degree may not be easy, but that's why it's your ideal job. There are many different fields that you can connect with your intended career path. You don't have to land a DoD gig to get relevant work experience. In addition, professional experience is not just something you put on your resume to help your application. It will make your coursework much more relevant and allow you to understand things with a bit of context. 4) If everything does work out and you get into a good program out of undergrad, in a few years you'll still be at a disadvantage because you'll have to compete for jobs with people that have all of your education and qualifications, but also the experience. Just getting that master's degree is no magic bullet. Ultimately only you can make the decision on what is best for your future. Just realize that there is a reason that the vast majority of master's candidates have professional experience. If they can do it, why can't you? I feel that the demand for Arabic speakers is extremely high in your field of interest (probably top 2 along with Mandarin speakers) so you shouldn't have much difficulty getting something relevant. On the other hand it never hurts to begin laying the groundwork...schedule a GRE test and hit the books, start feeling out professors for LORs, etc.

Ranking is just ordering everyone on the waitlist. Then next month if they find out there will be 50 open spots, they would contact the people #1-50 on the waitlist and offer admission. If those people decline they would keep going down the list. Being unranked means that all waitlisted applicants are put into one pool. In the same situation a month from now with 50 open slots, the admissions commitee would sit down and review all the applicants to determine who they want to offer. The advantage of this is that they get another chance to bring in the class they want by having good balance between the different concentrations, enough international diversity, etc.

Can you elaborate a little more on this? I got into SAIS but not into IDEV, and Intl development is my career goal. The acceptance letter says that I can still participate in courses and activities offered by the IDEV program, although I'm sure there is a process behind that and it's not just a free-for-all. Is this a matter of what you can actually put on paper as your concentration?

Do you seriously need me to explain why an apple is not the same thing as an orange? You realize that these are all different schools in different fields, right? Trying to compare them to anything other than their peer institutions is a waste of time.

Of course. The fact that you haven't gotten a rejection yet means there is still room for hope. I actually don't know how Georgetown handles dual degree admissions but it's possible that they are waiting to release your GPPI notification until SFS has an admissions decision as well.

A lot of people would rank Walsh and SAIS as 1a and 1b for IR masters programs. Elliott is in the next tier, but still an excellent school.

Was scared as shit to click that link, but I'm in! I thought my SOP might sink me since this was the first app I finished and my later revisions improved it considerably. However I did not get picked for IDEV, the letter said I could pick any other concentration. I think if the deadline had been 10 days later I would have gotten into IDEV with my improved SOP, but I'm definitely not going to complain...so stoked right now

That sucks, I feel extremely fortunate to have heard back from almost everywhere I applied, knowing that I already have some great options available is a huge weight off my shoulders. At this point I'm only waiting on SAIS and Ford. Best of luck to you!

Your background is not too different from mine. I am surprised you were rejected (although I didn't apply to American but have acceptances from similar places like GPPI and Trachtenberg). Possibly your SOP was lacking in some way? I feel like it's the most important part of an application and a rushed or flawed SOP can really hurt you, while a great one that clearly articulates your reasons for going to grad school can make the adcom overlook a lot of your flaws.

If I understand you correctly you originally had an 800 Q and it's been converted to a 166. Makes sense as a new 166 is 94th percentile and that would have been good enough for the 800 on the old format. I don't think it's worth it, yeah you no longer have a "perfect" score but retaking it is no guarantee of improving it above 166. You also might do worse on the V and AW sections. IMO a 166 is just fine for even the most quant heavy programs. At that point the adcom's opinion of your math ability will probably come down to your previous coursework and grades more than anything else.

that one was me

I applied to Evans. It's more of a backup plan for me, as it is certainly a good school but not my first choice (nor is it yours, I'm assuming). I added it to my list because Evans has a partnership with the Peace Corps Fellows program so there is another potential source of funding. I also used to live in the Seattle area and enjoyed it, so I can handle the rain. I don't know exactly why it isn't mentioned here more frequently, but if I had to guess, I think it's because it has more of a regional draw and many people posting here are interested in large NGO/non-profit or Federal work. The East Coast and in particular DC schools are very well connected if you want to go down that path. I looked at their internship numbers and 86% were in Seattle and only 4% in DC and 4% international. The final employment statistics change a bit but still have 3/4 of grads staying in Washington with the rest split between other states, DC, and international. I feel that Indiana's SPEA is similar. It is highly ranked, especially in environmental affairs, but their international development concentration is quite new and doesn't have the same track record as other schools. For the LOR I don't want to worry you since your apps were sent in long ago, but from everything I've seen, schools want to see at least one academic reference. It is a bit different if you are 10-15 years out of undergrad and going for a mid-career degree, in that case I don't think they expect you to track down old profs, since your work experience will be far more important. But realistically 4 years removed is not that much and there should be at least a few profs that you could contact. You're 100% right that you should not use a letter that only weakly supports you or where it is clear the recommender only knew you in passing. But I was in the same boat since I am an 07 grad, and I emailed two profs from my junior/senior years that I had gotten A's from. I am sure that they did not recognize me by name but I included my resume, papers I wrote for them, etc to help jog their memory, and got enthusiastic responses. You don't have to be the person that made brilliant insights every class, visited office hours frequently, and helped them on a research project to be someone they will remember. My Peace Corps director wrote my third recommendation and it worked out great since I was able to ask each person to emphasize different traits. IMO it is not as helpful if you have three people all agree that you are a hard worker with good attention to detail. Getting a mix of academic and professional references allows you to show a wider variety of strengths.

Right, I didn't mean to imply that you would be studying IR, but guessed from your profile you would be interested in a degree that you could apply in an international context. I applied to programs that will connect with the international development field. They go by a variety of names. Some of are MPP, some are MPAff, MPA, or Master of ID. As someone pointed out in another thread, the degree title does not matter so much, it really comes down to the courses you take and the focus of the faculty/school. I would suggest you take a hard second look at SAIS. Maybe reach out and look any friends/friends of friends/etc who are alumni that you could talk to.

Your international experience and language abilities are going to be a big help. I wouldn't worry too much about the undergrad GPA, your GRE scores will help show that you have "natural" ability. What may be an issue is that you started an IR grad program already and dropped out/are going to drop out (it's not really clear from the post). You will want to address that in your SoP because adcoms may question your desire and you need to convince them that if they admit you, things will be different this time. You didn't say how long ago the previous grad program was, but if it was recent I think it may hurt your chances more. For many people shooting for the top tier of programs like Berkeley and WWS, if they don't get in they will spend the next year or two improving their application by increasing work experience, volunteering, retaking the GRE, taking courses towards a grad certificate, etc, and then reapply again, rather than accept an offer from a school they are not really interested in attending. So when the adcoms see your application they could wonder why you bothered with the state school. I think it will be important that you get very strong letters of recommendation, preferably from former instructors, that will attest to your dedication and ability to finish what you've started, in an academic sense. Of course I could be completely wrong about all this, I don't have any special insight into admissions other than what I have learned from browsing this forum. I think you have good second choices. Other schools that you could consider are Georgetown, GWU, CMU-Heinz, Syracuse, University of Denver, UCLA. They have varying levels of international focus so you should look at the concentrations, course descriptions, and professor bios to see what fits with your interests. I am curious why you don't have SAIS as a dream school? It seems like their regional studies program for Asia would be a perfect fit for you and your language skills would count for a lot. If you didn't want to limit yourself geographically, you could still do a functional concentration.

Received a 7.5k/year offer today. Had my fingers crossed for more, but $15k less debt would be nothing to sneeze at.

Congrats and good luck!

I submitted my MPP application on 1/15 and got an email from Trachtenberg yesterday (2/16) saying I would be recommended for admission. Unfortunately no merit aid/fellowship offer though. I've seen a few other people say they were accepted but also with no funding, is GWU just stingy with their aid? Or is it because their tuition seems considerably lower than other private/out of state schools to begin with?

Based on previous years' posts I would not be surprised if they don't get aid decisions for this round out for another week or two.

So the last time I looked into FSO stuff (several years ago, so it's very possible things may have changed) this is how it worked, as far as #4 goes. Anyone please feel free to correct me if I'm wrong because this is all going off memory. There are five different career tracks (Political, Consular, Economic, etc) that you can choose from. I believe you have to pick before you do the oral assessment. The political career track produces the highest percentage of consuls and ambassadors and it's the most popular/competitive. Consular is usually the least competitive. There is a minimum threshold on the OA that is considered a passing score and gets you put on the list of candidates. Say it's like a 5.2/7. After every crop of OA's the new candidates get added to the list which is rank-ordered based on score, and when the State Department does another round of hiring they go down the list starting with the highest score and offer enough people until they meet their intake requirement. This is when your selected track will have a huge impact, because a 5.4 score on the consular track is almost guaranteed to get an offer but a 5.4 political would have fairly low chances. Seniority/time spent on the list plays no part, unless, I'm assuming, something happens like they have 3 positions left and 5 people with identical scores. The "lowest offered score" each year isn't public knowledge or published anywhere, but you can usually get a good idea from the FSO Yahoo groups. You can increase your final score through things like veteran status, foreign language ability, etc. However those are only added on after you make the list so your OA score still has to beat the minimum threshold. It can be a huge boost though, you can get something like a 0.3 increase by knowing a critical language such as Chinese or Arabic, which would make the borderline 5.4 political score a 5.7 near-lock to be picked. Other languages like Spanish, French etc don't add as much though. Good luck if you decide this is what you want to do. I can't tell you what your plan B should be but I can say that you will have a good idea of whether it's going to be short-term thing or "retake it next time and hope for the best" when you get your OA score.