Hi everyone and congrats to all of those who have been accepted! I’m stuck at home bored right now so ask away about anything Georgetown related.
About me: I was originally accepted into the College but I transferred to the SFS after my first year. Current sophomore, International Political Economy major, Spanish minor, involved with a number of clubs on campus.
Are the dorms as bad as people say? And how is the food? Thank you for taking the time to respond to our questions!
The dorms are really fine. Most of the time they are 100% clean and functional. Yes, some (but not all) of the stories you have heard about maintenance issues are true, but when there are things broken or a bit dirty it tends to be more of a nuisance rather than something that truly affects your quality of life, and things do get fixed/cleaned. Housing itself is quite standard fare: you will not get luxury living but you also don’t have any of the cramped forced triples that you’ll find at some state schools either. Freshman and sophomore year you’ll probably have a reasonable sized double room, with either hall or in-room bathrooms, and juniors and seniors have options including singles and/or apartments with kitchens and living rooms.
The dining hall food is hit or miss quality wise. However, there’s quite a wide selection available, especially on weekdays, so you have a good chance of finding at least a couple things you like on any given day. Also, even though the Georgetown neighborhood is on the fancier side there are some cheap eats to be found: check out the $3 sandwiches at Falafel inc, and Curry and Pie is a student favorite for an affordable restaurant meal.
How hard is it to transfer into the SFS and what is the process like? Is it possible to / do you think it’s a good idea to try and transfer before your first year? I just got into the MSB but I am starting to think SFS will better suit my interests in international studies. Thanks!
Hey, thanks for doing this AMA. I just got in the SFS, and I have some questions about it.
Notactive: If you think you don’t want to do business at all, then sure, might as well try to transfer now so you don’t have to spend a year in the business school. I can’t speak to how hard it is to transfer before starting but if you’re going to do it, I would email admissions ASAP. If you’re interested in both schools look into the new joint degree: https://bulletin.georgetown.edu/bs-in-business-and-global-affairs/
As for transferring after you come to Georgetown, the end of freshman year is the main time to do it. I transferred COL->SFS then. Basically, you will have to write an essay on why you want to transfer, and then they look at your classes taken and GPA from freshman year. If you have good grades, a head start on some SFS-related coursework, and a good reason to transfer, it probably won’t be hard and I know many who have done it from the College and MSB. But I also know at least one person who got rejected because his grades were too low, and no I have no idea what the exact grade cutoff tends to be.
Neolib: 1. Your workload can vary greatly based on a) which/how many classes you take in a particular semester and b) how much you care about academics/your GPA. Some classes may require several hours per week of work while others demand nearly none outside of class. In general though, most people will study a good amount during the week, but rarely do people spend all weekend in the library.
Homework for most classes generally includes reading, sometimes with required written responses ranging from a few sentences to a short essay. Reading could be anywhere from a few pages to a book per week, sometimes you really have to do it, sometimes you don’t. Most classes SFS students are taking will have 1-3 essays per semester to do on your own time as well. Econ classes and some others won’t have essays but will have problem sets as well. Then of course there are midterms and finals. The environment is NOT competitive at all, and people will help each other out, even in the minority of classes graded on a curve.
@Neolib I’ll jump on to add onto somewhere2022’s answers – current IPOL junior in the SFS who’s also bored at home lol.
Workload in most classes is heavily reading-based. The most important thing to learn is to figure out what classes to prioritize and what readings are actually necessary. Often times you can skim a reading and still be prepared for class, and the professors know that you’re doing a lot of reading, so sometimes they’ll tell the class which readings to prioritize, especially for seminars that tend to be very heavy on the readings.
In terms of competitiveness, I’ve found that SFS students tend to be competitive in the sense that everyone else is doing these amazing things, and it pushes people to do their best. People aren’t competitive with each other – study groups are very common, but people push each other to do well because students here tend to be the kind that want to excel, regardless of outside pressure.
The SFS deans can sometimes be helpful, but oftentimes it’s older students that’ll be most helpful, since they can tell you which classes/profs to take and things like that. A lot of clubs will do stuff like advice panels when class registration comes around to help out the freshmen.
Almost all SFS classes are going to be discussion-based to some extent. Many of the larger intro-level classes like Intro to IR or Comparative Political Studies will have discussion sections with a TA, and upper-level seminar courses are usually smaller and based heavily on discussion for participation.
Did you take the Problem of God course, and if you did, what were your thoughts on it? Also is it true that deferrals/waitlists/rejections come in a 50¢ envelope while acceptances come in a 65¢ envelope? How hard is it really to get off campus?