Columbia Teachers College vs Vanderbilt QM vs NYU ASSR

[yg1024]

Hi All, 

I know this is really last minute but I have been going back and forth on my decision and couldn't really decide. Basically I applied for the applied statistics in education and got accepted by Teachers College (Ed.M. in Measurement and Evaluation), Vanderbilt (M.Ed. in Quantitative Methods), and NYU (MS in Applied Statistics in Social Science Research, A3SR). 

The program at Columbia seems weird because for the past six years or so there have been only two years when the program got only two students. The other years there were no students who chose this program (including last year). I'm pretty sure this is not a good sign but wonder if anyone has any other opinions (or an inside scoop) on this. 

The program at Vanderbilt is very new (they accepted their first cohort last year, 5 students in total) and it has an internship part attached to it. Basically all students have to complete either a semester long or a summer internship before they graduate. I'm not sure about the location (I wasn't able to make a visit) and the surrounding job market. If someone could provide insights on this, it would be very much appreciated. 

The program at NYU is also new (they started two years ago and they have their first graduates this May). It seems nothing special but it is considered a STEM program (as an international student, that means I can have H1B visa lottery three times instead of one) so I'm still considering it. They expect to recruit ~15 people this year. 

So I'm looking for information on:

1. The quality of these three programs.

2. The location and the surrounding job market.

3. Is it worth to go to NYU just because of it's a STEM program?

Thank you all in advance. 

 

Edited April 12, 2016 by yg1024

[frankcj3]

so what do you choose at the end?