Making a decision from overseas?

[Rhymenoceros]

I'm currently living in Asia but I don't have the time (or money) to get back to the US and attend the open houses for grad school.

I've been accepted to Georgetown MSFS (no $), SIPA (no $), SAIS (still waiting to hear about aid - but probably no $) and also accepted to the Univ of Chicago CIR (received 1/3 tuition fellowship). I've read through all of their websites and feel that in terms of curriculum and the path I want to take, Georgetown and SAIS seem like the best fit. I want to focus intensely on economics (specifically trade, investment & govt-private sector relations) combined with studies on China policy. I'm really more interested in pursuing a professional, rather than an academic, program.

Do you think it's a bad idea to not visit these schools? If you were in my shoes, is there anything that you would want to know or learn more about before committing to a particular program? I guess I'm just trying to brainstorm some ideas.

In the meantime, I think the best course of action is to use Facebook to try and find students in these programs to get their truthful, unvarnished view of each program. Does anyone have any other tips or idea?

Thanks.

[decisionsihope]

I am living in Beijng and am much in the same boat. I have been admitted to SAIS, Fletcher, Maxwell and waiting on HKS. I am basically counting on aid (kicking myself I wasn't in a position by 1 Dec to apply for WWS) and the packages from SAIS and (hopefully...) HKS aren't in yet.

As for ways to get a better idea of the schools, I've asked the admissions committees to put me in touch with recent graduates living in Beijing or with the similar areas of focus. Hopefully they'll come through next week. Other than that, thank god for these on-line chats because there's not much else we can do.

Good luck and hopefully we'll both be presently surprised from SAIS with China focused aid which will make the decisions for us : )