I'm going to ______________ and this is why!

[policy_applicant]

Congrats on picking a school, Plate! It sounds like a good match for you.

[Ruslan]

Hi everybody!

THIS IS WHERE I'M GOING TO ATTEND: Cornell's CIPA, MPA

OTHER SCHOOLS I CONSIDERED: NYU Wagner, GWU

WHY I CHOSE MY NEW SCHOOL:

1. I almost broke my brain making a choice between CIPA and Wagner. And the clicnher was my future concentration - I plan to focus on science and technology poicy, and Cornell offers plenty of related courses.

2. Campus life and community - that was very important. Cornell seems very friendly and open, with a real college spirit. Regretfully, NYU didn't show it.

3. Faculty. Cornellians are pretty sociable and ready to help. They were promt in decision-making, I received the offer in late January, and since then we've been communicating closely - all it gained my favour.

4. Many other details like atmosphere (Cornell is cut out for studies, nothing disturbs or diverts), nature, and etc. And, btw, red is my favourite color

[Demetrios2011]

THIS IS WHERE I'M GOING TO ATTEND: Cornell's CIPA, MPA

OTHER SCHOOLS I CONSIDERED: Indiana SPEA, Washington Evans, Carnegie-Mellon Heinz

WHY I CHOSE MY NEW SCHOOL: Cornell impressed me early on by responding promptly to my application and offering a substantial fellowship. They did an excellent job of communicating the strengths of their program. I actually prefer their interdisciplinary and academic approach, because I will be able to take graduate level classes in Cornell's world-renowned Economics, Planning, Africana Studies, and Natural Resources departments as a primary component of my degree (rather than the occasional elective.) I intend to concentrate on Environmental Policy, with a focus on international conservation, env economics, and natural resources management (particularly in issues pertaining to Africa and the Caribbean,) and Cornell's depth and breadth of offerings and faculty in these areas are nearly unparalleled. Being outside of DC is not a huge issue for me, as I already have some government and international experience (and am aware that the OPM's hiring practices are arcane and networking is not nearly as helpful as some people assume,) but nonetheless Cornell offers a semester in DC or one of several international locations.

Incidentally, I liked a lot of what I saw about Indiana and CMU, but Washington could hardly have given me a worse impression. I won't go into all the details, but I would be very interested to see their yield numbers for this year, as I expect them to be quite low. The whole process has taught me that the USNEWS rankings are nearly meaningless (and if you take even a casual glance at their methodology, you may understand why this is.) I would much rather go to Cornell than every school on that list, with the possible exception of Duke and Yale, which schools I did not even apply to for whatever reason.

[pizzatime]

THIS IS WHERE I'M GOING TO ATTEND: Tufts UEP (Urban & Environmental Policy)

OTHER SCHOOLS I CONSIDERED: Duke Nicholas School, U Michigan School of Natural Resources, U Washington, U Rhode Island Marine Affairs

WHY I CHOSE MY NEW SCHOOL:

1. Not interested in Fletcher because I'm not an IR person, I'm into domestic environmental policy. UEP coursework is exactly what I'm looking for, coursework will be exactly the same as Duke

2. It came down to Tufts or Duke but I want to work in New England so being around Boston is pretty important to me, as well as cost since I don't have illusions of raking in $200,000 anytime soon as some people do in these threads

3. Faculty in my interest areas, and opportunity to do interdisciplinary work in science and engineering (Tufts is big on that.)

4. They came through with really good funding and after I accepted I found out that they have a new loan repayment program that helps out alumni working in public service.