Best schools-international relations/international studies???

<p>For one of the "best" schools in terms of being respected by grad schools (but not so hot as far as name recognition), look at Michigan State University's James Madison College. It's a small residential college within MSU (a not highly ranked, but well respected, large public U). It won't impress your average employer any more than any other big public school, but Madison is one of the best programs for preparing students for postgrad education.</p>

<p>what schools in the west are the best to transfer to if you're planning to major in IR? i've noticed that almost all schools have IR under political science, but i'm more interested in the economics aspect of it and so far uc san diego has been the only school in the west, that i've researched, to offer that. also, what types of jobs can you get with an IR degree? i'm still debating over landscape architecture or IR, but i'm leaning more towards IR i'm just not sure what i can do with it.</p>

<p>If you're female - look at Mount Holyoke College. They have a broadly diverse student population and a good percentage of the students study abroad.</p>

<p>One should really disregard JuanEatsPandas remarks re: Chicago. Really no basis for them.
Chicago has a great international relations department which is highly ranked. I believe that it may lean somewhat more than some of the other schools towards a more holistic view, which includes studies in history, anthropology and the like as well as traditional political theory. The school has some great study abroad opportunities with school sponsored institutes in places like Paris, Barcelona, South Africa and Mexico. If you are thinking of going into academia down the road, Chicago can be a great choice as well. My child and her friends really love it there and have a great social life as well.</p>

<p>You may want to take a look Pitt ([Univ</a>. of Pittsburgh: University Center for International Studies](<a href=“http://www.ucis.pitt.edu%5DUniv”>http://www.ucis.pitt.edu))</p>

<p>There are less than 20 schools that have four or more area studies programs designated as National Resource Centers (US Dept Edu) and Pitt is one of them. The centers with such designation at Pitt are Asian, Latin American, EU, Russian/East European, and International Business. Pitt also has one of 20 some Confucius Institutes in the U.S. (designated by the Chinese Ministry of Education) and is one of only ten European Union Centers of Excellence (funded by the European Commission). It also churns out quite a few Fulbright scholars and is in the top 15 for Peace Corp volunteers. It also has a unique Nationality Rooms program that helps fund student exchange. The graduate programs in GSPIA (<a href=“http://www.gspia.pitt.edu/[/url]”>http://www.gspia.pitt.edu/&lt;/a&gt;) are generally well regarded and is a founding member of APSIA. </p>

<p>For convenience sake, here’s a list of schools with 4 or more NRCs. Hopefully I’m not missing any:</p>

<p>Berkley
Chicago
Columbia
Cornell
Duke
Harvard
Illinois
Indiana
Michigan
Penn
Pitt
Texas
UCLA
UNC
Washington
Wisconsin
Yale</p>

<p>hm to all the naysayers on NYU, US News ranks it as having the 10th best Int’l Pol grad program, along with MIT</p>

<p>[International</a> Politics - Political Science - Graduate Schools - Education - US News and World Report](<a href=“http://grad-schools.usnews.rankingsandreviews.com/best-graduate-schools/top-political-science-schools/international-politics]International”>http://grad-schools.usnews.rankingsandreviews.com/best-graduate-schools/top-political-science-schools/international-politics) </p>

<p>as for it’s undergrad program, it is relatively unknown, but only because it is relatively new. nevertheless, admission is extremely selective and prestigious. it is available ONLY as an Honors major, a GPA of 3.65 is required for admission and retention. you can only apply once. and only 20-30 students are chosen from an applicant pool of several hundreds a year</p>

<p>and most of the faculty are from the NYU Poli Sci grad department anyways. </p>

<p>…just to put things into perspective</p>

<p>Georgetown, for sure!
Not only are there distinguished professors and wonderful classes,
the school itself is beautiful and known for strong academics.
Great guest speakers too, esp for poli sci and intl relations majors.
My freshman year, former secretary-general of the UN - Kofi Annan came to speak!
This year, President Obama came…
Also, Madeleine Albright is our professor/lecturer for international relations here at Georgetown! Sweeeet :)</p>

<p>IR majors do not exist at Columbia or UC Berkeley…</p>

<p>Mini’s list is incredibly flawed… btw</p>

<p>It’s not my list. As already posted, Berkeley does indeed have a “concentration” in IR. And Dartmouth (one of the highly ranked schools) has it as a subfield within the Government Dept.</p>

<p>But the question Foreign Policy Magazine asked of more than 1,700 foreign policy academics/professionals, was not which had the best IR program, but which school was best for students who wished to pursue a career in IR.</p>

<p>@baahaaboo </p>

<p>UVA does have an international relations program, but the name of the major is “foreign affairs”.</p>

<p>@ Mini:</p>

<p>Your Foreign Policy Magazine top IR ranking is considered to be highly flawed by many members of CC forum…</p>

<p>… It’s not ranking of the best political science program with IR concentration… It is a ranking of the best undergraduate IR* programs* period.
For one, I believe it is ridiculous that a school with Political science or Government with a sub track in IR can out compete a full blown existing department IR degree conferring program… especially in a ranking of the best undergraduate IR program.</p>

<p>The best IR undergraduate program question was only one of a much broader 50-question survey. Considering that some of the schools ranked above in the study don’t even have specific International Relations programs, I don’t think many of those surveyed had a good sense of the best programs. Most academics knew the graduate schools better.</p>

<p>I’m not quite sure how valid/credible Foreign Policy’s rankings</p>

<p>They just ask professors to list what schools they thought were best for IR.</p>

<p>I think the undergraduate rankings were poor, especially since a lot of the professors they surveyed were graduate school professors who really have no idea what undergraduate IR programs are good besides Harvard, Princeton, etc…</p>

<p>I think its pretty telling that as you pointed out, many of those programs do not even offer an IR major. At Columbia, you have to set up your own major or create your own IR major.</p>

<p>In addition to having graduate IR professors rank undergraduate program… They even have it all wrong too!</p>

<p>Do you honestly think **Harvard’**s Kennedy Government school with subtrack in IR is better than Georgetown SFS undergraduate IR?</p>

<p>It’s pretty much undisputed that Georgetown has the best undergraduate IR program in USA… but according to Mini’s top IR rankings… Georgetown is ranked fourth behind Harvard, Princeton, STANFORD? never in a million years!! Georgetown is renown for IR… SFS is the best undergraduate IR school in the universe… Apparently, graduate professors didn’t know that… Too bad for them.</p>

<p>Georgetown SFS is the Wharton of the undergraduate IR world…Ppl give up Harvard for GTown SFS… lol, not the other way around!</p>

<p>“They just ask professors to list what schools they thought were best for IR.”</p>

<p>Again, false. They didn’t ask what schools they thought were best for IR. They asked which schools were best for students who wished to prepare for a career in IR. So, again, the fact that there isn’t a major called IR is absolutely irrelevant. (I don’t know why you are so tied to this red herring. If it makes you feel better - though I can’t fathom why this should be a consideraton-do you have a horse in the race? - simply take out the 2 or 3 schools that don’t have a major, subfield, or concentration in IR, if it makes you happy.) And again, graduate school professors would be the best possible position to know, because they see (and serve on the admissions committees) for those students come out of undergraduate schools to pursue a career in IR. (Unlike USNWR, where the “peer scores” are virtually meaningless.)</p>

<p>And again, it is not my list. It has by far the largest sampling of academics/professionals in ANY subject among any such surveys in the country - and more than 50% of them!</p>

<p>

WRONG!!!</p>

<p>**41% of graduate professors from across the nation were asked in one question out of fifty in a survey…</p>

<p>“Rank the top 5 best undergraduate programs for international relations” </p>

<p>and those schools mentioned are tallied with respect to the number of times they were mentioned (in %)**</p>

<p>Here is a good link for anyone interested in international relations…</p>

<p><a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/college-search-selection/542089-narrowing-college-list-international-relations.html[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/college-search-selection/542089-narrowing-college-list-international-relations.html&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

<p>Btw, only 7 out of the 20 schools listed have IR degree conferring programs… 12 schools do not, even Michigan ranked at #9 doesn’t even have an IR department or offers no such major! </p>

<p>For IR, I highly recommend Georgetown, Tufts, Johns Hopkins, Claremont McKenna, American, Swarthmore, George Washington, Macalester and Middlebury.</p>

<p>JHU is tops. Maybe better than Tufts. I believe Hopkins IR program is more rigorous than Tufts. (ie 4 econ requirements at JHU, not so at Tufts)</p>

<p>which school has a better program chicago U or Brown U?</p>

<p>The University of Colorado - Boulder has a great International Affairs program. All students are required to specialize in a region of the world and become proficient in a language of that region. As a first semester freshman, I have already met with UN Ambassadors and International Economists. Plus, Colorado has one of the most beautiful campuses in the country. It may not be a prestigious as Georgetown, Tufts, or Hopkins but CU is the perfect university for anyone looking for a great education and an amazing college experience. </p>

<p>[International</a> Affairs Program, University of Colorado Boulder](<a href=“http://iafs.colorado.edu/]International”>http://iafs.colorado.edu/)</p>

<p>Does UVA have a specific international relations program?
I looked on their website and didn’t see one.</p>

<p>Tufts would be at the top!!!</p>