What do all of the people in the photo collage below have in common?
They are all students or alumni of SIPA that have recently had either an interview or their biography posted to our web site. If you did not know already, we have interviews with over 100 students, alumni, faculty, and administrators and you have access to all of them simply by clicking here.
This is a great way to for you to hear directly from those who are “in the know” and I encourage you to take advantage of this resource.
One topic that sometimes will come up when prospective students are considering where to do go to school are the pluses and minues of geographical location. Geographical location of a school is a logical topic to consider and I thought I would provide a bit of input to complement the entry below, submitted by current student Lacey Ramirez.
There are certain tangible benefits of going to school in a particular place. If you go to school in New York you will be close to the United Nations for example. However, if you were to go to the United Nations today and stop ten people that work there, it would be highly unlikely that all ten graduated from a school in New York.
I would say the same for Washington D.C. I have several friends that work in D.C., however none of them went to school in the greater D.C. area. In short, and I am not providing earth shattering insight here, you do not need to go to school where you wish to work. I went to school in Portland, Oregon and have worked in Pusan, South Korea, Santa Clara, California, and New York City.
Another fact that you might be interested in is that the second largest network of SIPA alumni in the world is located in Washington D.C. We do understand the desire of our students to have exposure to what Washington D.C. has to offer and one part of this is our annual Washington D.C. Career Conference.
In addition to the article below on the 2011 Conference, I think you will find the following former blog entries to be useful as well:
Without further delay, here is the entry composed by Lacey that she wrote after attending this year’s conference.
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A very important question one has in choosing a graduate school is what kinds of employment opportunities will come from a particular school. This was a central question when I was looking at programs, and I was especially interested in those that offered some kind of professional development. At SIPA professional development is a core component of the curriculum.
Each year we are required to take a day-long professional development course. The courses are tailored to meet different interests of students in the program, and include the following topic areas: private sector, international students, career changers, media and communications, and international/nonprofit sectors. Courses are taught by successful SIPA alumni and professional recruiters. I have often used the resources and materials that I gained from these courses in my internship and job searches.
Another really interesting professional development experience offered at SIPA is the Washington DC Conference, which is a 3-day event offered during winter break. I participated in the conference this year, and it truly was a great experience and central to the job search I am initiating as I enter my last semester. The conference provided a great opportunity for me to gain exposure to my different fields of interest and practitioners. Also, the conference is only open to SIPA students making it really easy to maneuver and feel comfortable.
The first day of the conference included panels on different sectors and covered topics such as corporate social responsibility, urban and social policy, international development consulting, security policy, energy policy, multilaterals, and the list goes on and on. It was challenging for me to narrow the ones I wanted to participate in!! Admittedly, I am not typically a huge fan of panels, but I was incredibly impressed with the practitioners who led them. The panels were also mediated by a staff member from the SIPA Career Center, and the audiences were just the right size for questions. The best part was being able to approach the practitioners after the panel and exchange contact information!!!
The second day of the conference was a series of site visits. The visits included many different offices in the federal government, consulting firms, development banks, think tanks, and private practitioners. It was a whirlwind of visits and also provided an opportunity to connect with specific offices of interest. I also realized in a site visit that I am extremely interested in a particular organization that I will be applying to this spring. The best part is that I have a series of contacts that I now know, and I can email them for guidance through my application process.
The evening of the second day of the conference the Career Center organized an event at the Four Seasons Hotel in Georgetown that was a little more informal event with hors d’oeuvres and drinks. SIPA alumni in the DC area were all invited to the event, and it gave us another venue to get advice from seasoned professionals and recent grads. I also appreciated that it was a little more of a relaxed environment in which to network.
The final day is reserved for one-on-one informational interviews. The SIPA Career Center sends out a list of SIPA alumni available to participate in the interviews. I then sent out a number of emails to alumni working in offices of particular interest to me. I was able to set up about five interviews, and it was a fantastic process. The ones I chose were different from the ones I visited on the 2nd day, and it really helped me to narrow down organizations that I am specifically interested in and the potential job opportunities that fit my interests.
The best part of the conference is it provided current students exposure to a number of varying fields ranging from security policy, humanitarian affairs, development, and even included private sector opportunities in finance and economics. I was able to cover my range of professional interests, and I know several other people who also felt satisfied with the experience. I have made some amazing contacts through the whole process, and I have a new sense of confidence about applying for jobs. I am very pleased that I chose to participate in the conference, and it truly was a great benefit to me.
Jordan Becker’s time in the MIA program is funded by the U.S. Army – that is, his Masters in International Affairs. He has served in the Army for nine and a half years and could easily do another nine, or many times that.
Becker is a second-year student at SIPA. He spent his first year at Sciences Po in Paris (as part of a dual degree program with Columbia). Throughout his interview, he kept the conversation general, insisting that was for his own personal privacy, not because anything he did was a secret. His missions and jobs are generally public information. Talk to him in person, he’ll tell you almost anything you want to know – just don’t bring your pen along.
Becker weighed each word carefully. He spoke in bullet points. Everything he said was rehearsed in his head. Whatever he said that wasn’t rehearsed was off the record, and tended to be the most fascinating details. And, as he spoke, he had a careful eye on the pen and notepad in front of him.
“I want to be very careful of what image I represent of my profession because I have a lot of respect for the other people here at SIPA and elsewhere who do what I do, and also for my profession’s role in society,” said Becker. “Also because people don’t really have much exposure to people in my profession, so I don’t want to be perceived as representing the whole organization. I’m only speaking for myself as an individual.” Later in the interview he added, “I think sometimes our activities are inaccurately caricatured.”
Becker is from California. He planned to go to the University of California for free, but he really wanted to go to Georgetown. “I needed funding, which ROTC provided,” he said. That’s when he signed up for the U.S. Army.
He studied International Relations and was an intercollegiate athlete in his first year at Georgetown. “My life as a student wasn’t affected too much. It was basically like having an extra class or two a week. And I had to cut my hair and shave my beard,” he added.
After graduating from college and doing the Army’s standard initial training, he moved to Italy. He was a platoon leader there until the onset of the Iraq War in 2003, doing combat training. “It was an airborne unit and we mostly trained for airfield seizures and non-combatant evacuation operations.” Usually the scenarios had to do with civil instability.
“Airfield seizure was the first thing we did in Iraq. The first week went pretty much like training – we seized an airfield. Once there was no more traditional war to fight, that’s when it got complicated, and that’s when it got interesting to me. I got to apply what I learned in college and learn a little bit about what it really meant in practice. My academic background helped me to do my job, and it helped me explain our mission to my soldiers.”
Becker went to Iraq without much hesitation. “Privately I questioned it. But my obligation to perform my responsibilities was much more important… my job was to execute foreign policy, not to make it,” he said. “I signed up for the army knowing it was a tool of foreign policy, and that foreign policy is never perfect. I knew I would go forth on decisions made by those higher up.”
Becker left Iraq in February 2004. He then went through a long process of training to transition to another role in the army. He returned to Iraq for eight months in 2007 during the Surge and served as an advisor to an Iraqi organization. After that, he spent the next year doing more training.
In the summer of 2008, Becker went to Mali, as part of small-scale U.S. operations in the Pan-Sahel region. The army helped the Malian government control lawless areas of their country to prevent extremists from using them as a training base. Becker was basically like a consultant during that time. “It is one of the most fun things I have done in the army,” he said. “I was advising people who were a bit senior to me in rank, and they were very talented and dedicated professionals.”
When Becker returned to the U.S. at the end of the summer in 2008, he began to apply for graduate schools. He described his decision to return to school as a simple professional calculation. To him, it was the equivalent of someone in investment management getting an MBA.
But Becker is not your typical second-year SIPA student. While most of the class of 2011 is now worried about finding a job for May, Becker has jobs lined up for the next few years. His next step is a rotating faculty position at West Point. He expects to stay there for two or three years. He will then move on to work as a ‘foreign area officer’ focusing on Europe and transatlantic relations.
To prepare for his new roles, Becker is in the International Security Policy concentration at SIPA and the Europe regional specialization. How does being on the ground relate to the academic theory? “The biggest lesson I have learned as a practitioner has been about the practical limitations of the use of force… You hear about the ‘fog of war,’ or ‘friction.’ You really see the fog of war. I learnt what that looks like and feels like. It’s really there.”
What is a “typical” day like for a SIPA student? Carrie Dorn offers her perspective . . .
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When I first informed my friends about my acceptance to SIPA, they gave me a lot of unsolicited advice and some of it turned out to be very useful. I was advised to pack in all of the rest and relaxation that I could get before the school year started by catching up with acquaintances and family members, organizing my house, reading some non-fiction, seeing the newest movies, and taking a vacation. Being the type of person who has always had a busy schedule, I didn’t imagine that the life of a student would be much different from my work life.
But, now that I am at SIPA, I pass this wisdom on to you. Life at SIPA is busier and more exhilarating than you can anticipate. Between classes there are lectures attend, cover letters to write, and networking to be done. At night there are socials to go to, documentaries to watch, research to gather, and group presentations to practice. The days of a student are long, the homework never-ending, and always learning opportunities not to be missed.
Here is a snapshot of what my day looked like on a fairly typical Tuesday in mid-November . . .
Wake up at 6 am and brew some coffee. Feeling awake!
Read and respond to emails and proofread a paper proposal to be handed in tomorrow. Running late!
Power walk to my 9 am class, Advanced Generalist Practice and Programming at the School of Social Work. Today’s topic is integrating qualitative and quantitative data for comprehensive asset-needs assessments. Meet with my group after class to discuss interviews and edits for our project, determining the strengths and needs of individuals reentering the East Harlem community after incarceration. So much to be done!
Report to SIPA’s Office of Admissions and Financial Aid for work at 11:15 am. Talk to prospective students on the phone and in person about the impressive work that they’re doing and their future career goals. Extraordinary applicants!
At 2 pm, meet with a fellow student and plan for our upcoming conversations with administrators about the inter-school coordination of dual degree programs. Advocating for improved processes!
Stop by the Office of Career Services to schedule an appointment to review my resume with a counselor. Find out the dates and times of upcoming New York City Career Panel sessions. Filling up my planner!
Report back to the Office of Admissions for the afternoon hours to assist in filing and answering questions about the admissions process by email.
Go to the 6th floor computer lab to print out materials for tomorrow’s classes and chat with friends.
At 8pm go to the Brazil Trip information session to find out about SIPA’s Spring Break Trip to São Paulo and Rio de Janeiro. Pizza dinner provided!
Get home around 9:30 pm, finish up homework and plan for tomorrow. Jump into my comfy bed at midnight and fall asleep. Dream until the alarm goes off tomorrow morning!
The following post was submitted by Brittney Bailey. Brittney is working in our office this year and she, along with several other students, are contributing posts throughout the year. Another helpful entry on this topic written from an administrator standpoint can be found here.
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One of the most common questions we at admissions are asked is:
“What are my chances of getting into SIPA if I am a younger applicant? Do I even stand a chance?”
Usually these questions come from prospective students who have been out of school for 1 or 2 years or those who are in their final year of their undergraduate program and want to transition straight into graduate school. And many times, these specific questions are deferred to me.
I entered SIPA one year after graduating from undergrad and was commonly marked as the “baby” of every group assignment or SIPA bonding-experience. The reality is that SIPA does lend itself to students who exude a certain clarity and confidence in what they want to do and know how their degree program will specifically fit into their career goals. Of course, this isn’t always the case, but older students with more professional experience generally fall into this category.
So, from one “young” student to another, I wanted to list a few key tips to keep in mind when approaching the admissions process to professional schools like SIPA.
Be aware of the statistics
Think Quant!
Be clear about career objectives
Don’t be afraid to “stay out of the game” (for a bit)
Having said all this, it is possible to be a young student at SIPA and make the most of your experience. I hope these tips, at the very least, help out some of you who have asked this common question.
"The most global public policy school, where an international community of students and faculty address world challenges."
—Merit E. Janow, Dean, SIPA, Professor of Practice, International and Economic Law and International Affairs
