<p>I am currently serving in the Peace Corps and hope someone can give me an idea of how much this will help my chances with International Relations or International Development programs. The intercultural aspect is unbeatable, but most policy work is done at a very grassroots level and work is largely unsupervised. Is it generally regarded as legitimate IR related experience? How much can I expect it to help an application over come other deficits?</p>
<p>Speaking of deficits, and this is much more personally focused, I made the mistake of majoring in Marketing in undergrad before discovering a passion for international aid work. I have done my best to steer onto a different track, but am having trouble assessing how I come together as a Masters candidate. I have a 3.6 GPA with a semester abroad in Beijing and 1 years teaching experience in Henan, China. In college I volunteered or interned at a number of NGO's, including The American Anti-Slavery Group and International Rescue Committee. For the past two years I have served as a development volunteer with the Peace Corps in rural Namibia. I just took the GRE's in Cape Town and scored a 730 verbal and 750 math. My major weakness is a lack of background in econ and math, which is a heavy requisite of many top programs. I plan to take macro and micro economics at a community college in the spring.</p>
<p>Any suggestions on what programs might be a good fit for me? Also, I am considering postponing graduate school to gain another year of work experience and to take a few math and econ classes at Northeastern in Boston. Do people feel this is advisable? Will it help my chances of getting into a better program?
Thanks for any advice.</p>