Kindly provide advice

[veeraa]

Hello

I plan to apply for international development and policy programmes for fall 2010. I plan to apply for KSG, Yale, SIPA, GSPP and UMich.

The following are the statistics.

I completed a five year integrated Masters in Communications at a top 10 technical university in India. My GPA was 8.23/10 .

I was an intern at UNICEF and was a summer research fellow at the Indian Institute of Technology (Indian equalent of MIT).

After university I joined a premier agriculture,environment and rural development research institute as a project associate. My work extensively focusses on rural development and extension (ICT for development, bridging digital divide)and starting this year I shall also be working on Climate change and how rural and coastal community(rural fisherfolk) needto adapt and the extension strategies needed to prepare such vulnerable communities.

I work under a top policy maker and a visionary of food and environment policy in India, also popularly referred to as the father of "Green revolution". All in all By the time I apply I shall be having two years of work experience.

I have already taken my GRE and have the following scores.

Quants 780 and Verbal 750.

However I lack courses in economics and quants. To rectify this I have enrolled my self in distance education(Weekend classes) for Masters level courses in Micro economics, Economic statistics and International economics. However it is not possible for me to take courses in Macro economics as it is accessible onjly after completing the masters first level courses. However I am confident of scoring good in the papers mentioned .

I can get solid LOR's from my boss who was the father of green(AGRARIAN) revolution and from my former prof's who have now gone on to lead some big commonwealth organisation as regional heads.

Kindly help to me understand as to what chjances I stand for being admitted into KSG, Yale, SIPA, GSPP and UMich. Also provide advice onto what areas I need improvement.

[dagger]

*waiting for Linden's magic eight ball link*

[veeraa]

*waiting for Linden's magic eight ball link*

Hello buddyMy query might have sounded funny to you but the truth is back from my place, the education system ins completely differnt , one can get a ton of advice on application into Engineering schools in US back here in India but we rarely come across someone capable of providing adivce on Public policy education, that is one of the main reason I have been posting in a couple of forums. Now only if you could be a bit more helpful

Cheers

[splic]

veeraa, dagger was only referring to this handy little link: http://web.ics.purdue.edu/~ssanty/cgi-bin/eightball.cgi . put another way, it simply means nobody here really knows exactly what it takes to get into those schools. (we're all hoping we have it, though)

you seem to have an excellent academic and professional record, and the extra months between now and when you apply will no doubt increase your chances of getting in. your economics courses will also probably help you.

i think that in a month's time, everyone here will have a better idea of what each school looks for in its candidates!

[linden]

Dagger, I would have posted the link to the eight ball, but Splic stole my thunder!

Veeraa: Indeed, like Splic said, when it comes to HKS and WWS, it is hard to make predictions. That's why the eight ball has become a handy tool on this forum. That said, you appear to be a strong candidate for all the schools you mentioned. Good luck!

[Dreams]

Oh please, I am not even going in for a third round with that ball. On the other hand, it did say I would have some nice dates this year. And I already had a really nice one, with a follow up tomorrow, so I can partially vouch for its accuracy. Let's hope it is not completely accurate though.

OP your experience looks impressive, and you will likely get into one or more schools on the list. I echo linden about WWS. HKS MPP I am a little more optimistic about for you because of their larger cohort size. Financing the degree may be a problem though. Either way good luck.

[dagger]

My apologies for the original post. I think your GRE scores make you particularly competetive. In addition, work experience is always useful. It sounds like the people you have writing your LORs are also impressive, but I'm a firm believer its not who you have writing your letters but what they say about you.

Others may disagree, but I think a personal statement weighs heavily in the admissions process. Be sure to spend a lot of time creating one that you are happy with.

And, as others have said before me, admissions to public policy schools can be rather hard to predict. You just need to put yourself to be in a position to be as competitive as possible and it appears you have done so.

[golonghorns]

Veera,

You'll be fine. You should definitely get into some of those schools.

[policy_applicant]

Also, if you're applying to all the top schools, you might at well add Princeton WWS to your list.

It looks like you've done about everything you can to put yourself in a good position for admission. Now all you can do is write a good SOP and wait and see.

[younglions]

Veeraa -

You mean to tell me that Norman Borlaug is still active in the field? He must be around 100 years now. Or is there some other person that South Asians recognize as the father of the green revolution?

Anyways, like others have said, you've put yourself in a position to get some good news in about a year. Good luck!

[veeraa]

First of thank you all for providing advice (Sounds more encouraging). I have no words to express as to what a breather or a wiff of fresh air it has been for me reading your posts as I have none to guide me or talk to regarding Policy studies abroad in India. Also aplogies for delayed reply as I was in field (Rural India) I was not able to post.

Congrats for making to the schools you have applied I am sure I will be meeting some of you next year in case I end up in your school.

I still do have some queries. I hope you can kindly bear with me.

you seem to have an excellent academic and professional record, and the extra months between now and when you apply will no doubt increase your chances of getting in. your economics courses will also probably help you.

Work experience is one of my primary concern. By the time I will be applying I will have work experience of roughly 1 year and 7 months but I will be working post applications and by the time I admission decisions arrive and I leave for joining the programme I shall have completed approximately 2.3 years. Thus I was wondering whether the schools will see me as an applicant that will bring into table more than 2 years of development related experience or will they count my experience at the time of applying alone.

Also apart from post college experience I was associated with the instute for an additional six months for my thesis ie I was spending full 4 months at the instute studying ICT and development issues during the thesis semester and continued and joined the instute directly after college and am continuing the similar work except for the pay I receive so will that also count as experience?

My apologies for the original post. I think your GRE scores make you particularly competetive. In addition, work experience is always useful. It sounds like the people you have writing your LORs are also impressive, but I'm a firm believer its not who you have writing your letters but what they say about you.

No issues dagger you need not be apologetic infact I aplogise for not taking the humour in right vein.

Veeraa -

You mean to tell me that Norman Borlaug is still active in the field? He must be around 100 years now. Or is there some other person that South Asians recognize as the father of the green revolution?

Yes Young lions he is recognised as father of green revolution in India, a world food prize winner, adviser to successive Indian governments and someone who worked closely with Borlaug during the initial stages of green revolution.

Anyways, like others have said, you've put yourself in a position to get some good news in about a year. Good luck!

First off congrats for making it to WWS and and all the schools of your choice, an incredible achievement indeed.

I was particularly worried about my communications background as I have come across very few applicants who majored in communications and went on to policy schools.

Although I wll complete macroeconomics (Distance learning) coursework before joining I am not in a position to complete it before applications however I will be completing economic statistcs and mocroeconomics (Distance learning)before applying. Will this hurt my chances of applications?

[wendol]

I was particularly worried about my communications background as I have come across very few applicants who majored in communications and went on to policy schools.

I don't think you need to worry about anything. I have a Bachelors in Electronics Engineering from India and have received admits from decent schools like Elliott, American et al for the Fall 2009 International Affairs program. I never applied to the big ones like Georgetown/SIPA or to the public policy focused schools like HKS, WWS.

I had lesser GRE scores, really really bad acads, good LoR's but not from such heavyweights and only a year of experience while applying, in the climate change industry. I guess the SoP is a very important part of your application and I worked on mine for more than 4-5 months. That is the only thing you need to concentrate on and things should go through smoothly. In your case, financial aid would be comparatively easier too!

Good luck.

[jointdegree]

I was in a similar boat as I only had basic calculus and stats, and then took Intro Micro and Macro at my local community college after undergraduate. Out of the schools you are interested in, the only one I applied to was Columbia SIPA. For the specific concentration I applied for at SIPA though, they strongly emphasized that applicants need a heavy econ and quantitative skills to apply. However, I explained in my personal statement that based on my GRE math scores (790), that I believe I have the foundation to succeed in their program. It appears to have went well as I was offered admission, though I decided not to attend due to the high cost of tuition.

[veeraa]

Wendol Congrats on making it .

Alas someone from India I can relate to. Wendol I am sure the large number of Math courses in your engineering degree must have made you applealing for several schools you had applied.But however my course work involved little or no math as I was a media and communications student.

I was just curious as to your work in climate change, what aspect of climate change were you working on.

Also 4 month preparation for SOP! must be one hellava

I was just curious as to your work in climate change, what aspect of climate change were you working on.

Also 4 month preparation for SOP! must be one hellava SOP. SOP is one area I am concerned as I don't know whether inbetween work and econ preparation I wSOP. SOP is one area I am concerned as I don't know whether inbetween work and econ preparation I will have time to sculpt an SOP.

Wendol or anyone for that matter is it possible for you to PM me you SOP barr your personal details so that it will provide a brief idea or a base for me to start on ( I can understand in case you are not willing to share, kindly do so if it is OK to do so).

Regards

Veeraaa