My son (VA resident) wants a career in international relations (I know, this can change, but I doubt it) and has been fortunate enough to get accepted EA to Georgetown SFS, UVA (not Echols Scholar), American U Global Scholar, Geo. Mason honors, waiting to hear from W&M. EFC too high for any aid, - we’ve already pretty much ruled out Gtown because of the price difference (65K vs 28K for in state). He loves DC, and loves the idea of the AU Global Scholar experience, but is it worth passing up UVA or W&M to go there, assuming (doubtful) they offer him enough aid to make it close? For what it’s worth, I’m pretty sure he’d be happy at any of them.
Personally I would not give up UVA or W&M to go to American. He can always do a semester in DC as an exchange student to get that experience.
^Me either. I would go to UVa or W&M over American U. Then, like @happy1 said, he can do a semester in DC as an exchange student (American might even have an exchange program with one of those schools), or a summer internship in DC, or potentially an international one (which would be even better).
If Georgetown is unaffordable, then W&M or UVA are indeed the next best thing, with the DC semester and other opportunities in this field.