<p>yougotjohn,</p>
<p>JHU shines at the graduate level, but at the undergrad level I'd say that GTown certainly can keep up with the best of them.</p>
<p>what are some good LACs for IR? </p>
<p>i know macalester is good, but there has to be others out there</p>
<p>Colby's program is pretty good.</p>
<p>"Haha. 5 points for the most useless post."</p>
<p>Just five?</p>
<p>Help!!! My parents/teachers are pressuring me to start looking at schools to apply next fall, I need help form people that have gone through the process and can give me a realistic opinion on where to apply. I want to major in international relations and minor in business. I apologize in advance if I post in different forums but I am not sure in where it belongs. </p>
<p>Gender: Male
Ethnicity: Mexican
Weighted GPA: 3.7
Frosh Year 3.0
Sophomore 3.9
Junior 4.1
Class Size: 1300
Class Rank: N/A
Spanish SAT II: 760
US History SAT II: 750 (projected in practice)
Lit SAT II: 680 (projected in practice)
SAT: 1900/2400 *will re-take in June</p>
<p>AP Courses
English Lit
English Lang (3/4 projected practice)
Spanish Lan (5)
Spanish Lit (4)
US History (4/5 projected practice)
Euro
Econ
Stats
Psychology</p>
<p>Community College Classes</p>
<p>Poli-Sci 103 (94%)</p>
<p>EC</p>
<p>2 years Internships
Community Resource Center<br>
Democratic Party
(100+ hours both)</p>
<p>4 years School Leadership program
Frosh Class Treasurer
Senior Class Treasurer
ASB Comm. of Assemblies/Homecoming
300+ Community service at school</p>
<p>3 years Varsity Lacrosse
1 year JV </p>
<p><em>Also, I think that the fact that I attend a all white school has some weight at the admissions departments.</em></p>
<p>Gourman rankings for undergraduate International Relations:</p>
<p>Tufts
Princeton
Johns Hopkins
Georgetown
U Penn
Harvard
Cornell
U Wisconsin Madison
MIT
Stanford
UVA
Notre Dame
US Air Force Acad
US Military Acad
Claremont McKenna</p>
<p>How are the IR programs at:
UNC-Chapel Hill
Columbia
Michigan
Duke
Northwestern
U. Chicago
Vanderbilt
Wash U.
and American?</p>
<p>michaell,</p>
<p>Undergrad or grad?</p>
<p>How in the world could Gourman place Madison on that list and not GWU? I really don't trust it....</p>
<p>Anyways, I'm planning on doubling-majoring, either with a Pol Sci/IR or a Pre-Law/IR. I'd like to enter International Law, and the salary in that field should be noticeably higher than a beginning State Department job.</p>
<p>Tufts' IR undergraduate progarm is consistently ranked number-one, or number-two, switchin off with Georgetown. Right NOW, Gourman ranks it's number-one! The Fletcher School, the graduate IR school (the oldest in the nation!) is also consistenly top-ranked by Foreign Policy, the authoritative IR journal.</p>
<p>According to this year's Gourman report, the best undergraduate programs in International Relations are, in order:</p>
<p>Tufts
Princeton
Johns Hopkins
Georgetown
U Penn
Harvard
Cornell
U Wisconsin Madison
MIT
Stanford
UVA
Notre Dame
US Air Force Acad
US Military Acad
Claremont McKenna</p>
<hr>
<p>(FYI: The Gourman Report states that its ratings are based on "extensive reseach" into the following criteria:</p>
<ol>
<li>auspices, control, and organization of the institution</li>
<li>numbers of educational programs offered and degrees conferred (with additional attention to "sub-fields" available to students within a particular discipline</li>
<li>age (experience level) of the institution and the individual discipline or program and division</li>
<li>faculty, including qualifications, experience, intellectual interests, attainments, and professional productivity (including research)</li>
<li>students, including quality of scholastic work and records of graduates both in graduate study and in practice</li>
<li>basis of and requirements for admission of students (overall and by individual discipline)</li>
<li>number of students enrolled (overall and for each discipline)</li>
<li>curriculum and curricular content of the program or discipline and division</li>
<li>standards and quality of instruction (including teaching loads)</li>
<li>quality of administration, including attitudes and policy towards teaching, research and scholarly production in each discipline, and administration research</li>
<li>quality and availability of non-departmental areas such as counseling and career placement services</li>
<li>quality of physical plant devoted to undergraduate, graduate, and professional levels</li>
<li>finances, including budgets, investments, expenditures and sources of income for both public and private institutions</li>
<li>library, including number of volumes, appropriateness of materials to individual disciplines and accessibility of materials</li>
<li>computer facility sufficient to support current research activities for both faculty and students</li>
<li>sufficient funding for research equipment and infrastructure</li>
<li>number of teaching and research assistantships</li>
<li>academic-athletic balance</li>
</ol>
<p>The weight given to each criterion above varies by discipline. )
lolabelle is online now</p>
<p>"US Air Force Acad US Military Acad" That's strange</p>
<p>Strange=Totally omitting GWU'S Elliott School and USC. See my post at the Tuft's site.</p>
<p>GWU has specialized courses, deans, research institutes, faculty in IR and it doesn't even get ranked while two Service Academies do-this Guy Gourman is just silly.</p>
<p>Can you imagine the disservice this guy causes when, because of his list, a bright student might not even look at a School like GWU Elliott with its journals, research institutes, separate IR faculty etc. when planning out his future academic career?</p>
<p>Would it put me at a disadvantage to go to Davidson for undergrad (polysci) and then try to go to an elite grad school for IR?</p>
<p>And, since I'm already on here, what school do you think is the strongest in Russian studies?</p>
<p>One last question- How would you go about getting into a diplomacy related career?</p>
<p>Absolutely not! Study hard and make the most out of your undergradute education, and you'll go anywhere you want later.</p>
<p>As far as getting a career in diplomacy, getting a MALD (master in law & diplomacy) is a good place to start. Tufts' Fletcher School is famed for those.</p>
<p>It gets even Stranger-American U's School of International Service with its separate IR faculty, budget, research etc. is totally dissed by Gourman for Schools with no serious commitment to IR.</p>
<p>Question-why would an oufit like Princeton Review associate their name with a Guy like Gourman, who is so totally off the mark?</p>
<p>mwellington,</p>
<p>For grad, any of the top 10 programs in IR would be a good bet, but consider SAIS and Gtown.</p>
<p>Aren't all the schools mentioned so far that's good for IR only for graduate school? Or are some of these schools also beneficial at the undergraduate level also?</p>
<p>These rankings were published in the March/April 2007 Issue of Foreign Policy Magazine.</p>
<p>Top 20 Undergraduate Programs</p>
<ol>
<li>Harvard University 48%</li>
<li>Princeton University 46%</li>
<li>Stanford University 30%</li>
<li>Georgetown University 28%</li>
<li>Columbia University 28%</li>
<li>Yale University 23%</li>
<li>University of Chicago 21%</li>
<li>University of California-Berkeley 12%</li>
<li>Dartmouth College 11%</li>
<li>George Washington University 10%</li>
<li>American University 10%</li>
<li>University of Michigan 9%</li>
<li>Tufts University 8%</li>
<li>Swarthmore College 8%</li>
<li>University of California-San Diego 8%</li>
<li>Cornell University 6%</li>
<li>Brown University 6%</li>
<li>Williams College 5%</li>
<li>Duke University 5%</li>
<li>Johns Hopkins University 5%"</li>
</ol>