Columbia - MSW

[lifeincartoonmotion]

mai.youa.lor I'm taking you up on your offer!

A few questions if you don't mind!

How is NYC?

Was it hard to pay for school while living in NYC? Did you have a job?

How are the classes and professors?

Did you start out knowing anyone in your class?

Any random information you would have liked to know....the good, the bad, the ugly!

Thanks!

[mylstisr]

Hi ielah,

I moved from Madison, WI to NYC, and it was a really hard transition for me at first. I tend to take longer than other people to adjust to new environments, so for the first like...6 months I was pretty miserable. But very quickly after that, I fell in love with NYC and now I don't want to leave. The neighborhood CUSSW is in [specifically Morningside Heights] is really cute.

Financial aid is a sore point with me. I got full fellowships to get MSWs at other schools, but I turned them down because I wanted the NYC experience and the Columbia name. I took on a SHIT LOAD of loans, the max amount to live and go to school in NYC at CUSSW- sometimes I really regret it when I think about how I have almost $xx,000 in loans now thanks to CUSSW. But then again, I think about the experiences I've had in NYC and somehow in the grand scheme of things it makes sense...

To be honest, if I were in it ONLY for the MSW and I wanted to be a practicing social worker, I should have gone to a different program. I honestly don't think MSW programs are that different across the board. The Council on Social Work Education kind of ensure a universal curriculum. But I knew I wanted to go on and get a PhD, so I needed a program with research productive professors and enough of a policy emphasis. I also wanted the option to explore international social work, which some schools really cannot offer.

The classes are excellent, the professors are excellent. The administration is a pain, like any bureaucratic institution things happen slowly. sometimes you wait forever to find out if your financial aid has gone through (such a pain that i did not experience at other schools). CUSSW is one of the largest MSW programs, and that's something I feel like people don't really advertise. My class is like 200+ people, whereas other schools have significantly smaller classes. It didn't bother me though.

I did know people who were already at CUSSW and so that really helped with the transition. But it's also very easy to make friends quickly and CUSSW provides a lot of social activities that, if you attend, will help you make friends.

I can't really tell you more about the curriculum without knowing what you want to study- i can only speak about the concentration track i was on. But for a lot of people the field experience is really key and people often complain about that...but from my experience that seems to be something MSW students are generally unhappy with across the board.

Anyways, that's my open and honest opinion! Hope it helps. In general, I am glad I went to Columbia, but everything has it's pros and cons. I know a lot of people who were extremely unhappy with CUSSW and a lot of people who really liked it. I tend to fall in to the more "liking it" side.

[Gumball12]

Hi Mylstisr, I Got accepted to Uchicago on 2/9 with $28,000 for the first year (renewable for the second year!). Also got accepted to Columbia on 2/8. Received my package in the mail today. Still waiting on NYU, WUSTL, UPenn. I am thrilled about both my acceptances, but am torn between which one I would pick. Always had my heart set on Columbia because of NYC and the name of columbia. But UChicago is offering a huge scholarship, and i've heard many good things about their program. However, finances are not the single most important factor for me, since I can afford both programs. I just need more clarity on which program is better, where I would get a better experience. Btw, I'm pursuing a clinical concentration. Any advice would be appreciated! (I saw some similarities in the way we think, and the fact that we both like columbia for nyc, th name, etc. so I thought you would provide some good advice.)