Suggestion & Chance for Master Program

[imanusman]

Dear,

I am a final year undergrad student at International Relations Dept in a top univ in Indonesia. Expected to be graduated in Feb 2013.

My profile:

- GPA: 3.61 / 4,00

- Haven't take GRE yet (still in prep course). - though, I am not really confident with the score

- 10 years volunteering experiences, including founding a national youth-led org in youth empowerment for social change - catalyzing youth to be agent of change.

- Founding a start up online media that produces weekly podcast of inspiring stories from Indonesian people, attracted more than 30.000 subscribers.

- International public speaking experiences, book author, & doing probono services for some community development projects

- Have no full time official working experience

- Internship experiences in Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and an education foundation

- Some international and national awards in youth leadership and community empowerment

- National Best Student Award

Goals:

In the future, I plan to be a professional consultant at an international organization or development agency at my home country, and to engage more in education policy-making process, while continuing my role with the organization i founded as an advisor. I also want to educate more people, and to teach at university to mainstream international education development that is still not well known in Indonesia, while preparing and realizing the dream to create an impactful social enterprise that provide consultancy for schools, teachers, and students in Indonesia in the long term.

I'm planning to apply to:

- TC Columbia University - International Education Development

- Stanford - POLS

- HGSE - Education Policy Management

My questions are:

- What are my chances for schools I am applying to?

- Does my goal relevant enough with the schools I am applying to?

- Among these schools above, which one is most likely fit with my background and goals?

- What are other schools that I can consider to apply?

Thank you so much!

[SeriousSillyPutty]

I can't help you much, but here's a few things to check out:

This is a good blog post with some information on determining how good your chances are with the program:

And you may already know about this, but U.S. News & World Report (a weekly news magazine) publishes rankings of schools. Here's their page for grad school education programs: http://grad-schools.usnews.rankingsandreviews.com/best-graduate-schools/top-education-schools

I would recommend reading up on some professors at the schools you're interested in whose fields seem similar to yours, and seeing if it aligned. Many department websites list graduate students (well, at least PhD students) so there might be students you could contact for their perspective.

Good luck!