<p>Hi everyone, I am a senior anxiously awaiting responses from several schools this April.</p>
<p>My tentative major is International Relations. I'm looking for some input on which school would be the best fit for this major, in terms of academics as well as research and internship opportunities, etc. Any advice would be great! (Especially from current students at any of these schools). I'm also interested in Environmental Studies, Psych, and will definitely be studying a language. </p>
<p>I've already been accepted to the Honors program at Northeastern early action.
I applied to Brown, Georgetown, Tufts, Wesleyan, Penn, and U. Delaware. I don't expect to get in everywhere... but want to start thinking about my possible options. </p>
<p>Georgetown and Tufts stand out as your best IR options, but Brown and Wesleyan (and the others) would be good too. </p>
<p>I go to Tufts, and while I’m not an IR major, I can assure you that IR plays a huge role on campus. The school has a huge focus on internationalism and global issues, and there are lots of internships available. I’m a cognitive science major (started out as psych), so I can testify to a really good psych program with some truly amazing professors. Languages are also really good here (but hard!). I’m taking 2 languages and after 1 1/2 semesters of each I know more in those 2 languages than the one I took for 4 years in high school. I’m not sure about Tufts’ environmental studies program. Our science programs in general are very good, but I’ve never heard much about environmental studies - I don’t think it’s an extremely popular major. </p>
<p>In terms of IR, though Tufts and Georgetown have equally good programs, Georgetown probably has more internship/government opportunities since it’s right in DC. Wesleyan and Brown won’t have as much access to government internships since Wesleyan is in a small Connecticut town and Providence isn’t exactly government central. </p>
<p>I don’t know much about UDel’s or Northeastern’s IR program specifically, only that the schools themselves are pretty good.</p>
<p>for the Tufts student, a quick question: how many semesters of language is required and how effective are they in terms of reaching influency if a student tries to be fluent?</p>
<p>Georgetown’s School of Foreign Service is generally considered in a league of its own for International Relations and similar fields. However, all of those schools are excellent, and you’ll be good wherever you go.</p>
<p>Honestly any top school will prepare you well for a career in IR, schools like Brown, Dartmouth or UCB might not be especially known for IR, but I’m sure they’ll prepare you very well (and not disadvantage you) if you decide to go into IR. </p>
<p>Organizations like the UN or Freedom House do not exclusively recruit and hire the majority of their students from a few schools like Wall Street firms do, when they get a compelling applicant for an open position, they’ll give the candidate a fair shot regardless of school affiliation.</p>
<p>For Tufts you need 6 semesters of a language, 8 if you’re an IR major. However, you can also do 3 semesters each of 2 different languages, or supplement 3 semesters of a language with 3 culture classes. The language programs are really, really good. I can’t answer your question on fluency yet, since I’m not in upper-level classes, but friends of mine who are in Spanish/French/etc. 5 and 6 are reading a lot of literature (book-size) in those languages. I still think the best bet for fluency would be a semester or year abroad to supplement language classes, but Tufts will definitely get you near-fluent.</p>
<p>^ That survey is a joke.
First, it apparently was sent only to IR professors. Generally, this would mean professors that teach IR in a political science department. While international relations as a subspecialty is an important component of an interdisciplinary international studies major, such a major typically includes much more, e.g., international economics, languages/area studies, certain subfields of history, etc. Many of the interdisciplinary IR/IS majors offer various tracks within the major, international politics/relations is only one such track.
Second, respondents were asked to list what they considered the five best schools for IR. This yielded the percentage of respondents who designated particular schools in his top five. If you look at the rank order, the rankings were based on quite low percentages. Harvard, for example, had the number one rank, but this was based on only 21% of respondents picking that school in their top 5. If only 21% of respondents placed it in the top 5, that’s not exactly a solid endorsement of its number one rank. By ranking these results, it gives a very misleading impression that would appeal only to people infatuated with rankings even if the rankings are based on rather loose criteria.
Third, the criterion of “best” leaves a lot of things undefined. “Best” in terms of what? The survey does not specify any criteria for this.</p>
<p>@ ellopoppet- Thanks so much for your input! If I get into Tufts, I think it will be my first choice. </p>
<p>I would love to hear from any current Northeastern students/parents of students on the IR program and Honors program there if they are out there…! There’s only a certain amount you can get out of the website.</p>