Summer Admissions Webinar (August 2021)

Hello hello hello.

Welcome seeing some hello. So that means you can hear me. I believe I hope.

Maybe some of you saw this logistic slide just so you know if anything happens this does. This is being recorded and you will get a link to it later.

And you are here just hearing me. Thankfully, you are hearing me and you can use the chat box which many of you have found, so that's great. If you have any questions.

I will. We can either address them as we go or save them to the end.

If you want to turn on close captioning, just hit the little CC button up in the share box on the top right, or you can expand if you need to sleep the slides better, or make it full screens. So glad you're here. And why don't we go ahead and get sort of officially started?

First, I love to hear where you are all logging in from. It's a great way to practice the chat function and again make sure you can hear me. I checked the registrations and it looked like you were representing 21 countries. 18 U.S. states. So love to get a shout out where you're logging in from. Hello Toronto, as you all do that, I am Melissa McGinnis.

And I am the assistant director of admissions at the Jackson Institute for Global Affairs at Yale. Hello, Hello, Low DC jersey. Speaking of New Jersey, I have been the assistant director here at Jackson for little over two years now. But prior to coming to Jackson, I was at our friends. A nice fellow university down in New Jersey for 22 years and I moved up here to New England and in.

Really appreciating this New England vibe and will talk to you a little bit about all of the Jackson experience so.

Hello again, great look people from all over Korea, Germany, Michigan. That's great lot of registrants from all over the world. I'm assuming the time zone might be an issue for many so hopefully hello to all of you who might be watching this on the recording.

Meetings from New Haven, CT. Literally literally New Haven CT. I am in my office. Monday was my first day back after 18 months away so if any of you are repeat visitors and we're probably tired of seeing my spare room backdrop, I am back in my office were not fully functioning yet. We are slowly rolling in as our new students are rolling in and Yale will be in person this year.

But some staff are sort of rolling in like part time and what not. Orientation begins officially next week, so we're going to try and be all settled, but also remain safe and will see many of you are local and just keep paying attention to our visit or our events page or the COVID visitor link. Which. And maybe I should have brought that up for you.

You know Delta variants out there, and you know we're just playing it one day at a time, so not sure yet if we're going to have visitors on campus this fall, but we do have a lot of virtual events scheduled, so hopefully you can join us from that, but again, keep an eye on our events page. Hopefully that's how you found this, or you received a blast email from us so.

Glad you're here. And yes, so welcome. Many of you may already know that it's this is a big time for us. We are slated to become yells next professional school, launching fall 2022 as the junction School for Global Affairs. Super exciting time. Just this summer we got pre-approved to have a degree name change so our MA was turned into an MPP.

And we can talk a little bit about that. Or I can answer questions about that going forward. And we're just super excited 'cause this is a big deal, not just for us here at Jackson, but for you as a whole, since it because it is the first time since 1976 when the School of Management, which is just down the road, was founded and we're really excited. And there you might have questions about that happening, so I'm seeing some congratulations. Yes, it is a very exciting time, so we'll go through.

Some of these things I want to talk a little bit about.

The highlights of our program. If you're not familiar with it and we can dive into what I personally think is unique about our program. Having been in this business for, you know, well over 20 some odd years in the public and international affairs space, so hopefully we'll have plenty of time to get your questions answered. So let me plow through some of these slides. Forgive me if I'm scattered again, day three of being back into the office after.

18 months so just getting the tech. You're my first web and R with my new webcam so that's why I'm glad you can hear and see. And if there's any issues with that, maybe put it in the chat and I'll reach out to our IT department saying this didn't work properly, so it seems like it's going OK, so why don't we keep moving along here?

Uhm, let's see. I, you know I'm gonna need my my glasses for some of this. So alright, where are we? We are I I some of you who might be repeat webinar watchers may have heard me talk about the 5F's. I really like to utilize that as a great way to to point out the things that I think are that we should really highlight about Jackson and that hopefully will help you remember.

I'll go through some of these and you know 5 apps I call them family flexibility, faculty funding, and future. Think they're all probably pretty self explanatory, but I did go through and create individual slides for each of those. So again, if there's repeat visitors, I'm always trying to hone the slides a little bit. There will be a feedback form in in the email at the end of this that you get maybe by tomorrow. Love to hear feedback.

We're always trying to improve these to make them better for you to learn as much as possible.

So let's dive in the first F which is family. So I came up with the family because I think of our size. Now Jackson is known for its small size. Our cohorts are only about 30 to 35 per year. It is definitely a community atmosphere. It is a group of people, not just the students, but the integration of the faculty and staff and Senior Fellows and World Fellows, which we'll talk about in a minute and how we all come together and I could go back to.

Back to the slide where this picture of our building, which is. Yeah where I am again. Finally in the back of that building so you know, we're in this large Victorian mansion and on this second slide.

We've acquired two mansions across the street. We might not have access to those for a few years, 'cause the department's in there have to move out after their buildings are finished. So higher Ed. There's always construction going on, so it's definitely a very tight knit community, and there's a lot of integration integration. Not just that commitment to the global good, but to the whole Jackson experience in the senior fellows.

Being integrated into the community and we'll talk a little bit about that when I go onto the the faculty. F so it's, you know, I think our location here in New Haven. Not a lot of people know where that is. We are in the corridor. The Northeast Corridor pathway between Boston and NYC. Super Easy train ride to DC. So or in a nice little area. And again, I'm loving the New England vibe while we still have.

Easy access to New York City and I know a lot of people in the area or even even commute to there.

So it's pretty easy access if any of you don't know exactly where we are, hopefully that helps a little bit. Again, I'll blow through these pretty quickly. The next F is flexibility, so besides our size, I think the next.

A thing next biggest thing that makes us really unique that I hear from current students and alumni is the flexibility that we have. You take your four and this is for let me actually back up so we do have offered 2 degrees. So when I'm talking about General Jackson stuff in the community and everything that incorporates both our MVP NRMS when I talk about a lot of the requirements, it's going to be specifically about the two year MPP because the masses.

Very basic, it's eight courses, no core. Very, very small cohort, about two to five.

How we currently don't offer any funding for the mass. So often they're sponsored and check out our events page. I will be doing sometime next month a mass specific webinar. So if you're here and you don't feel like I get your questions answered, we're going to dedicate one to the mass who are interested in the one year program. So keep in mind that when I'm talking about all these requirements, it is in relation to the two year MPP, but obviously the masses.

Also very flexible because there is no core. The MPP actually has only four core, it's it's the stats, the econ and the drawing a blank. I was just on vacation last week.

Gun history and we've added a Apollo comparative politics class to really make sure people are taking the policy so I know the class. So to help with offering the MPP degree, most students did take that in the past. But beyond those four core.

You can take your the rest of your classes at Jackson or anywhere else at Yale, so I'm going to start posting in some things into the chat that you might find helpful, and this link is the courses database.

Uhm for Yale and something to note is if you do decide to poke around in there, you can do keyword searches. GLBL are the Jackson classes and hopefully the rest will be in pretty intuitive, but that's the whole beauty of being able to have this interdisciplinary program where you actually create your own path.

And it's.

It can be overwhelming so we can talk about that a little later. If you have questions about that, because you might do a keyword search on an area study or a language, or you know whatever the case may be, that you might be interested in and hundreds of courses may come up in something to keep in mind is a high level undergrad course. You might even be able to justify taking as an elective if you feel like it's not an option in, you know the graduate level courses.

You might have to do extra work for it, but there's a lot of case by case things that can be done, including directed readings which are classes that you do with the professor one and one. Again, if you feel that there is a particular niche class that you would need and the professor is on board with with working on that with you, many students do directed reading, so you really are creating your own path in your own curriculum and developing your own.

Certificate if you will. You don't have prescribed certificates, so you know that's just something to keep in mind, and I think again, that's what a lot of the people who've come through Jackson really appreciate that they've been working out in the field, and they all the sudden realize what they need out of a graduate program and they can build that in our program at Jackson.

A lot of students pursued joint degrees and most common are the law school or the school, the Environment, School of Public Health, and School of Management as well, and you know.

That shortens the program, 'cause each school agrees to count a semester for towards their program. But just to make sure it's clear you don't have to be a joint degree student to take classes at the other schools. The other schools are usually more than happy to have our Jackson students in our in their classroom because of sort of the unique nature and the cohort of of who you are. If you will. And I meant to paste the link in. If you haven't found our BIOS.

Our student BIOS let me copy that in so you have it because I think it really shows the depth and breadth of that the community, the student community that we offer. This is doesn't have the new students yet. They're just started rolling in. There's been a few people coming in the last couple weeks. I saw some yesterday. They had an informal lunch just outside, so they're rolling in, so we'll soon have their BIOS and focus up and you'll get a good picture of of what the full class.

Looks like.

Uhm, so let's see languages at Yale are pretty robust. We do have a language proficiency requirement, so if you do not have a non native English language proficiency requirement or have a non native English language.

You can test out of that if you are.

You can meet that requirement through testing and or however many levels you may have done in coursework. That's usually done sort of the summer right when you arrive to see where you land to see if you do need to take additional courses at Yale. And then many people want to take additional languages at Yale, and there's a cap on how many you can do of that. But again, the language opportunities at Yale are pretty robust, so if you speak one language but are trying to learn another, there's plenty of opportunities.

To do that, even in informal ways, it doesn't even necessarily have to be in the classroom. There's a lot of informal opportunities to do that as well. Let's see, uh, so I think I've covered most on this slide. We do have the required summer internship that MPP students would do between their first and second year. We have also with becoming a school, we are incorporating a leadership and ethics training workshop that's going to be kind of like an orientation for second years that students will do.

Uhm, you know for a week at the beginning of their second year.

Alright, let's keep going. This talks a little bit about the new program features I mentioned. The we actually went from 3 core to four core. I mentioned having the the.

Politics class the comparative politics class. These here on this slide are a couple other things that we've sort of been working on. Really integrating.

You know the the writing and the into the into the core classes. Really giving students an opportunity to develop both theoretical and practical skills. So we're building a lot of that into the core and we are, you know, they. The areas in the second slide are the most common that people pursue. International Security, diplomacy, social, economic development, etc. But again.

This is just sort of a direction that a lot of people go. There are some sample matrices on our on our pay on our webpage. I will actually post the courses page in now.

So you can find that and the bottom of that page this. This really describes the core curriculum and a little bit. I think it describes some of the other things that people do like the direction, readings and whatnot and the matrices sample matrices are at the bottom. Just keep in mind that the matrices are there, they're just samples, right? It's not a limitation. Don't feel like if you are looking at the course database that link that I sent you.

And there's a class that you like on there, and it's not on the matrix.

That doesn't mean you can't take it right. These are just.

Samples that help direct people a little bit.

OK, so hopefully that helps sort of explain a little bit the philosophy of the curriculum and some of the changes I'll move on quickly to the next F, which is faculty and we. This is one thing that I feel like is you know, we gotta get the question a lot. That will. How much are we going to change with becoming a school? We've really been operating as a school for many years so people say, well Jackson is new, were new and name.

Right, we've been the Jackson Institute for Battle 11 or so years now, but we are a new iteration of the IR program, Yale that's been around for 40 years, which is a founding member of APSIA, which, if you are interested in IR, you should be following abcya abcya.org.

You know we do a lot of events with them and they have a tremendous amount of resources.

So you know, as we were a founding member of abci of many, many, many years ago and apps team members also have to have.

Our own dedicated crew services and what not. So in any case.

We're going to be new again, right? We're going to have that. We're going to be a school, and so again, just new iterations of how we've been operating, but.

What one thing that we are hoping that we are already doing is building out our faculty more. That's one big advantage to becoming a school. Having our own ladder faculty are tenured faculty that were not just borrowing from other departments, right? So we're already building those out. We have been for the last couple years, but also on top of our Global affairs faculty and I can post that link in this link.

Actually will also link to not just our Global affairs faculty, but also our senior fellows are going to talk about a little bit, and I mentioned them briefly.

You know they are an incredible asset to the Yale and Jackson community and and you know, I can say I, like I said before, I've been in this field for well over 20 years and I've been on the road recruiting with our colleagues slash competitors and we'll, you know, even in my Princeton days, you know we travel with multiple schools, and I've heard the stories and I and I know that you know these big name people are.

They're at all of these top IR schools, right? They're here, they're around, but in my experience thus far, even being remote for the last year and a half is that they are genuinely fully integrated into the Jackson community. It's not just like they're blowing through, for, you know, a talk or a long, you know, three days with office hours, many of them have been sticking around for many many years, so usually they're here.

For a year or two or three, and some stay a lot longer and you know just to be transparent, not to scare you, but some of them will be reading your application so they serve on the admissions committees. So you might have former ambassadors you know are CEOs reading your application.

And so and, and they're around, right? They? We share the same coffee pot down the hall. Hopefully once we get all you know, post, post COVID and everything back to normal, you know they they give lectures in addition to their classes. And many. It's obviously case by case, but many are available for you know coffee grabbing a coffee and chatting with students. And I've just found that they really are interested in being connected.

With the Jackson student experience. So just keep that in mind as you're doing your research for your different schools about, you know the how these sort of networks come about, and again they are a network for you. One of my favorite stories, and I apologize if you're repeating him. You've heard it before one of our recent alum. She actually was a course assistant or a teaching assistant for one of our senior fellows and ended up getting her first job out of Jackson with him at his organization down in DC.

So it's not just.

Having them teach and giving their their practical skills and their practical experience, it really can become sort of a mentor and networking opportunity, which is why I still want to talk about the World Fellows a little bit. They are not faculty I'm going to paste that link in now too.

And while they're not faculty, they are super unique. They they've been around for, I think 20 some odd years now. They they are under Jackson's purview. They have met for quite a while now, but the world fellows are 16, rising in their careers, public servants, international students who are coming to Yale and to Jackson for one semester.

Or a very intensive experience and the website I gave you talk a little bit about that, but it also goes beyond that it they contribute to the Jackson community as well so you can. There are students who get hired as as World Fellows liaisons. Whether there are undergrad students or grad students.

And they give lectures. They give talks about their experience in their careers and the link I gave you. Actually, I think has the update of of.

Who I didn't lose you right. I clicked on something I think you're still there, right hello.

I was just going to sort of peek through that and it does show who the current ones are and they really are usually so incredibly interesting. You know couple years ago there was a, you know, a female. I think Nigerian Olympian who did activism and an Iraqi comedian who did you know political comedy and things like that so?

You also sometimes some people think, well, Jackson is so small, right? Like we're such a small cohort. Do we have enough by way of the alumni network?

We'll talk about that in the in the last F about the future and your future, but you need to also think about not just the senior fellows with the World Fellows is also part of your network so and they just add their student lounges right across the hall from our grad student lounge so they are fully integrated into the Jackson community. When we do events. Alumni events. Depending on where they are, they show up. I know a couple years ago there was an alumni event in London and students.

Blanton world Many World Fellows alumni were there so keep that in mind as you're as you're doing your research and thinking about networks.

The second last is funding. I think you know a lot of people might have liked to have heard this at first, but Jackson's funding is pretty robust. So again, I mentioned. Currently Rmas is not funded and which is why once the Nubiles off you'll see that there's a lot of these they call them PMK fellows, so a lot of international military sponsored and a lot of people who are foreign service officers and international.

Government, who are their employers, are sponsoring them to take the year off, so currently we're not finding that, but our MPP we it is merit based. But anybody who needs it gets something right. All you need to do is check the box on the application form and we will consider you for funding. Doesn't matter if you're international, domestic, whatnot. It's as simple as that and historically we have been providing a minimum award of half tuition.

So that's 22, some odd $1000 and then anything on top of that is is definitely merit based, and that's where we take into account a lot of those data points like your work experience, GPA series, etc etc.

And so it's pretty straightforward. UM, and this besides the faculty, I think the funding piece is the next big piece that we hope to be different, becoming a school. Our hope and dream is that we will keep adding on to that. So maybe someday I don't know how far in the future we would be able to fully fund our Masters students, which many of you know is is kind of rare. Most PHD's are funded, but it's it's kind of rare to have in masters.

Degree funded again my predecessor down in New Jersey had the MIC drop as far as funding was concerned and they do pretty much fully fund there's. There's this need based, but it's it's fully funded need based so we'll see. Keep an eye on us. I don't know if you're applying this year. If you're applying the next few years.

Keep an eye on us. We might be able to keep providing additional funding, and there's a note here too that for that required summer internship. If you end up in an internship that is not funded, then you can apply, I think is up to $5000 available. All right quickly. The last F, which is future, which obviously is probably what you all really want to know about like you are. I presume you're here because you were thinking about your future. You're thinking about your next step in your career, what you want to do in your job.

And.

I mentioned before as an axiom member. We have a dedicated career services career Development Office is what ours is called and they meet one on one with all of our students. As soon as you arrive, if not before and they do all of the typical career services, things like resume reviews and mock interviews and all of that. But they do the intake to figure out what are your passions and dreams. What do you want to do for your summer internship? What do you want to do for your first job?

Obviously getting out of here and getting you your first job out of grad school is the goal, right? So I want to make sure if this is a common question, so a lot of people ask what do our students do? This link I just see the :) from Matthew. I assume it's about the funding.

And this link has the sample summer experiences. Of course, you'll see the summer.

I don't know if they have the summer 20. Yes, Summer 2021 is not on here.

And of course, that was super unique. Everything virtual and then the jobs after Jackson. This one you actually have to drill down a little bit. If you go to the bottom of the page you have to click on that and that will open up the last. I think six years of its actual data. It doesn't have the names for privacy, but it has the organizations, the titles in the locations. And so when people ask me the question like which is a good Jackson students do. It's like just about everything.

RR

What our goal is is that people will go on and do something in the Global affairs arena. Obviously global affairs is very, very broad.

But it's people are pursuing that commitment in the global good. That's what we're looking for.

So hopefully if you take a browse through some of those as along with the student BIOS to see where people are coming from, you'll see that the depth and breadth of our our applicants and our alumni are.

It's just mind-blowing, especially for such a small program and is something we're very, very proud of. It becomes tricky for us and admissions because obviously to have such a small cohort, but to have as much depth and breath as we do, that's really important. So it's really not just about what you need to learn, but it's also what you bring to the table, and you know that goes on here talking about the networking and the trips. So again, like there's usually and hopefully again.

Fingers crossed post COVID that there's networking trip Cun where the current development office brings in employers as well as alumni and they have a trip to DC. And I'm doing a trip like everybody gets on a bus and goes down and stays in a hotel. So there are lots of opportunities for that and many many people actually come to Jackson as well.

And I think, dare I say, a blessing of the pandemic is the virtual is here to stay. So I think we already are imagining that there's going to be even more career and alumni networking opportunities because we can add to our in person stuff by having virtual events as well. So I think those are the five FS, right? Those family flexibility, faculty funding and future and then really quickly.

You also probably want to know how the particulars of applying and I looked. Again, I was on vacation last week, so I'm still playing catch up, but I looked and it appears that the application is open, so the application for applying for fall 2022 is already open. So if you're applying for this year, you can poke around there if you apply by December 1st, you get an automatic fee waiver. There is no admissions advantage that because it is not.

Rolling admissions it does help us get an idea of how big the applicant pool might be, but it's really for you. To, you know, have that extra time and saving the $105.00, but you must apply by January 2nd.

We get a lot of questions about the timing of things that are outside of your control, like your letters or recommendation and those test scores. They really should be in by the end of that week of January 2nd, and what I mean by regardless of when you apply. So if you apply and submit your application by December 1st, you have to register your recommenders, but they have until you know the week of January 2nd to submit their applications. Though a little a little trick that some some.

Applicants have said is they just if they're applying by December 1st, they tell their recommenders that's when the deadline is, because then, if they're late, it's not that late, right? 'cause then they'll still be in by January 2nd. So however you want to do that with your recommenders is it's totally your call, but they there is a window after the deadline after the January 2nd deadline that they can still submit, and then the test scores have to be officially requested from ETS, so you know if you take that and yes.

It is still required for the two year program and the TOEFL or IELTS is is required for non native English speakers as well. Unless you've in your undergraduate degree from AUS speaking country or an English speaking country.

So those test scores can also come in at the beginning of January. So usually if you take those tests by the end of December at the absolute latest, it's usually enough time. One practical thing is we are still using the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences application this year because we still belong to them this academic year, and the tricky part of that is when you log into the application and create your account, you will not.

See the MPP. You'll see the mass, but you will still see the ma, the old Ma and Jesus can't change that because they don't offer an MPP. So what this means practically is that it's totally fine. Yes, you choose the MA to apply for the MPP. OK, and hopefully that makes sense.

Uhm, and then we will officially separate from Jesus in the fall and we will come.

And all the back end technical stuff. Anybody who applies and gets admitted and chooses to enroll will be MPP candidates. So that's the one real practical thing that I'm a little worried about. See how that's going to play out in technical terms, but all of you on this webinar if you're applying this year, I know you won't need to ask that question now, right? But when you're doing your application, you should absolutely refer to the MPP, right? Don't worry about them not matching the the form and and.

The big thing is why Jackson, right? That's the big question that we need you to answer in your application and.

That should be the case which ever graduate programs are applying to, but I think it becomes really important to us because of our extreme flexibility and and because we are part of Yale, right? So we get a lot of people who say Yale is my dream school. OK, but as Jackson right? We are, we're the global affairs program within Yale and we fill that space in the Yale community and we want to know what it is about the Jackson community that you want to be a part of because Yale is.

Such a great big place and called it earlier. I don't know if you caught that on the earlier slide that we are an intellectual playground and you have access to all of it and.

We are this little composite here of this. This tight knit community, but you also, if you're taking classes of bud number one law school in the country, you're going to expand that network and you're going to have opportunities at other centers and you can get on lists, email lists for events that are going around on campus. And again, it can actually be a little overwhelming, so you have this safety of Jackson, the Jackson community, but you're you have the Yale community.

At large available to you. So again, we want you to tell us what it is you want to get out of this program. Don't forget to tell us what it is you want to do in your long term career. A lot of people leave that out of their applications, so tell us who you are. You know most personal statements or how great you are and how great we are.

You know, go deeper. You know what do you want to get out of it and how do you want to use this particular program to get to that particular dream job that dream career, ideally in the global good.

OK, so that's basically it. Our decisions go out in the middle of March, uhm?

And.

You know you have until May 1st to decide whether or not you want to enroll and then here we are in the end of August and people are starting to enroll. So let's see that's, I think that's pretty much it. I definitely want to leave time for questions. I our website is here. We have more events on the calendar. You can always email us. That's here. Follow us on social media. We don't how I gotta add our new Instagram account to that and there is a.

Link well, it's not a link for you right now, but you could follow that URL. I am happy to and I didn't open that up. I could give it to you in the link if I can open it up really quickly.

Anybody who feels like this wasn't enough. Hopefully it was to give you an overview.

Uhm?

I do have some one on one spots on my calendar.

If you feel you need that no requirements, right like this isn't, this is really about answering your questions, so there's we don't do interviews. There's no advantage to having a meeting with me. That's not going to. You know better your chances, but if you do have additional questions, feel free to reach out and to have like a short zoom meeting. So let's Speaking of questions. Let's get to them and make sure I do that all right. Let's say it's either.

My car, Misha. I'm not sure. Apologize underground. Agree with 70% English graduate degree 100% in two semesters. That and they were spent in EU S. We still need to fill it up. Goodness it's.

If.

I'm trying to think of how the wording is on the rule for that, UM.

You need to have received the degree, uhm?

The graduate degree doesn't count currently. To waive the TOEFL, it has to be an undergrad degree, so that is a new question and I don't necessarily know the answer of 70% is sufficient enough in an undergraduate degree. What I might recommend, since that is a new question. Even after all these years.

Is to email the Jackson Jackson dot admissions email address to ask that question and we can pass it on to Jesus to see what that rule might be. OK, sorry about that. Hopefully that helps and I'm going to write it down to to remember.

To see if I could find out, let me see MPP different from them. And how do you think the transition from the Institute school will affect the program's expansion? That's a great question, Sarah. I'm ahead on a little bit, you know. Really, I would say changing the degree name to the MPP really is more of a signal than anything else. Sure, we added that additional policy class like the comparative politics class. Again, people were taking those kinds of classes anyway, but the the reason for adding that to the corps.

So it would, you know, have that policy component. So we it's just changing from a Master of Arts to masters in public policy. But it you know the feedback that we've gotten from alumni and students is that that was more.

Sort of the the nature they preferred. Having that on their resumes. I you know, I don't think it matters as much in that regard. Having been at a school previously where the degree was an MPA and not an MP and that got confusing as well. So I've always preached all of these years. Is that you need to drill down to the curriculum and the requirements. I think everything else is nomenclature, but we did.

Really want to signal that it.

It's a, it's a professional degree, often in MA a Master of Arts can point to.

Maybe a stepping stone to a PhD, maybe more academic programs, which is what we are not being a professional degree, so that's that's one sort of component. So otherwise, except for adding that additional class, there's not anything that's really changing, and as far as overtime, I think I mentioned building out our faculty to be our own faculty to be much more robust and hopefully additional funding we we've been collecting this. Probably not the right word.

Pulling in research centers under Jackson. So we just had a couple new in this past year.

The International Leadership center. I believe it's called and another one that I'm drawing a blank on. So those kinds of things are happening, so really otherwise we're not expecting to grow the cohort size. We've been growing it over the last few years, just by a little bit. We have a lot of the MASI think I see in ask question, but we're building that out a little bit more by offering certain fellowships like it's called DPRK. Anyway, there might be.

More on the website later about that, so otherwise the sort of philosophical you know the the culture of who we are is not really going to change and also acquiring you know the Manchester Cross Street 'cause the staffing will need to change the centers and whatnot. So I hope that answers your question Sarah. So for students who do not have previously concourses, how are they considered in the admissions committee great? Great question. So couple things it's not required, right?

So, but I will be completely transparent. Those who have it probably have stronger applications, so ideally having some quant slash econ skills definitely strengthens your application. But again, there could be some other aspect of your application that makes you stand out that we want to be part of this cohort.

That we might be willing to overlook some of the con or stats or whatever the case may be.

And so in the past, we've always recommended those who are enrolling to take a class or refresher class during the summer part of the curriculum shift that we've just done is we are moving our ECON core class to the spring semester. So instead of the fall we're going to offer it in the spring and then people will be taking a diagnostic test at the beginning when they arrive to see where they stand.

In the E con where they are in their in their levels and if they need to take an ECON class to get them up to the level of the ECON core class that's required, they will be able to take that during the fall semester, right? So that actually was something that I think the feedback was that that was good to offer that rather than having people taking things all summer long in different places, so there will be an opportunity to do that.

In the fall semester if need be. So again, but having it, you have to get through the gate right? So we do an admissions and you have. There's econ professors on the admissions committee stats, professors, etc that serve on the admissions committee, so we definitely look for the strength and and you know, being part of a lot of these alumni virtual alumni chats, there's a couple more left this summer. What I have heard them say is, is really for your advantage, right? You're not going to be behind in the class.

Your if you already have that ECON 101, if you will skill set under your belt then you will because these classes are taught from like that policy social science perspective rate and how to use it and and do it in a how it applies to public policy international policy. So having sort of the basic skills can really you won't. You'll feel less behind taking the core classes kind of long answer.

And I hope it helps.

I'll keep going 'cause I want to make sure we have about 15 minutes uhm, and I'm going to take a quick drink while I read the next question.

A similar to Sarah's question, David, do you see the MAMP transition changing the types of career opportunities available to students you know? I'm going to say no, it couldn't depend on who you talk to, but if you take a look at the careers and links, I mean we've got people Jackson alumni who are.

You know, and they're ambassadors. There are people who are, you know, foreign service officers doing all sorts of things that are in alignment with the mission and and hopefully that will continue again. I think that the degree name is more of a signal and also being able to have that.

So having the the policy making sure people take a policy class right to as part of their curriculum.

Uhm, let's see next to be naira in my undergraduate degree was in LA and I have not taken any classes and micro macro. Do you think separate courses can help? It's a little bit different question, same idea, same thread, but that is a great question. Often again, I can't tell you to do it because if they're not required but many people do take.

You know a local Community College? Or obviously there's so many things online now. Anytime you take an additional class, whether it's your basic economy. Once that's 101, whatever the case may be, that again is a signal that you're serious about this and you're you know you're trying to get up to speed. If you're doing that now and you're applying this fall, we might have the grades, but even still again, the signal that this is something that you're committed to is is is important as well, so a lot of people do that, and definitely.

Submit any transcripts of classes that you've taken, sort of 1 off the degree you've received an undergrad doesn't really matter. It's really about the coursework preparation we're going to look for some, ideally some quant skills. Obviously we talked about language having some relevant IR type courses or regional courses that are connecting the dots with what your passions and career goals are. Again, I'll reiterate connecting the dots. I haven't talked about that yet, but I use that cliche a lot.

That we want to see what you did in your act previous academic life. What you've done in your jobs or your internships. If you don't have a lot of post grad experience, and again why Jackson and what you want to do. So hopefully those dots will connect and make sense together, but otherwise actual majors don't matter as much, but taking additional classes can obviously strengthen your application.

Uhm me, sorry. You missed the beginning. Are we going to become a school by the time applications open next year? If you're referring to next year, yes and no. So you're applying this year.

Anybody applying this year will be applying for the NPP, UM and it. The application will not be ours this year. It's still part of the Graduate School. Next summer we will have our own application ready for when people are applying. That's a technical issue. So yes, I think the answer is yes. If I'm understanding the direction of the question is so worse. Expecting fall 2022.

So far, COVID hasn't delayed that, so we're still on online for that. Neil is asking if the mass is a STEM designated degree. You know, I would probably say no. I I know that's a visa question and I you know.

You forgetting the what do they call it the?

The.

Oh, what is it? The oh I you know you're getting your training, your one year or two year. Again, apologize, you know day three working from the office and post vacation. But yes, the I think because it is so flexible and specifically the mass, there is zero core and you choose the eight classes you want to take. I don't know. I mean, I suppose you could end up taking most of your classes at.

The Yale School of the Environment and and that would work. Or taking classes out of SOM, but I don't know. That's more of a a visa type question that.

I I might get, my guess is no because it's not like it's not a math degree, it's it's. It's not an engineering degree. Yes, you can take those classes, but we're a global affairs program so.

I I can't perceive that that would be approved right, but?

That's the philosophical answer is you can make this degree into sort of a STEM program because of the flexibility, but I don't know if that's sufficient enough for the requirements for the, you know, the the training that you're allowed to stay for a year or two afterwards, apologies for not getting getting all the lingo wrong on that. So again, I'm going to blame it on vacation. OK, so Neil is also asking. I'm taking some non credit courses, Coursera, etc.

And I think I answered that in a previous question, anything you do above and beyond obviously can be helpful. Make sure you submit those transcripts and those as part in those grades. Part of your application, then those are definitely helpful to for us to have, especially if you didn't take them in your owner at program.

Uhm, let's see, note and apologize in advance. I'd like to know how many years of professional experience are needed. I'm starting my last year of undergrad this September. Great question. Always gets asked every webinar I should probably have one big slide about it or something like that. I did not address that yet. Many of you may have seen the.

The profile on our web page let me really quickly try to find it. We have about 8 minutes so I feel in decent shape up.

This page has the profile now keep in mind this is averages medians. We do not have a for the MPP. We do not have a minimum work experience requirement. The mass we do, it's 7 minimum seven years average is sort of 1215 for them, but as far as the MVP.

Average work experience is a. You'll see about three to five years. It is not required, but again, we're professional program.

It is it's and I mentioned this that it's not just what you need to get from us, but also what you bring to the table.

Again, small cohort lot of the larger programs. People who have less experience have a better chance of getting into those programs, so they have more room wiggle room. As far as numbers, but with a cohort of about 35 that's professionally focused and we really can only have a couple who are coming right from undergrad, you'll see whether reading the BIOS or looking at the profile that you know we are. We are sort of.

People right from underground and all the way up to their early 30s right in the NPP so they're all different levels of their career, and I think that's important and so we try to bring that in so there's no quotas with how many and one thing I will note, and maybe only U.S. citizens will be familiar with this, but a lot those who are applying where from undergrad, most of those spots end up going to the pickerings or angles because they're on the fast track in the foreign service. Again, perfect alignment with the mission they're prevented.

They are going into the Foreign service, which is what a lot of our students do anyway, so they're just doing it on the front end and the fellowship requires them to go to grad school right away.

And so it's we like having some of those in the class. And again, you know it. Just there might be people who are, you know, have are right from undergrad and have some sort of really unique life experience or amazing internships or Rockstar recommendations that you know.

We have we want them in the class and again we just can't have too many. So that's why the average is about three to five years. So anybody who doesn't have a significant amount of post grad work experience those internships that you've done during undergraduate wave much, much more heavily, something to keep in mind that so far is not on any of the slides, is that our recommenders we like, we require 3, and we want you to have at least one academic and one professional, and then the third is up to you.

And oftentimes, it's maybe if you're younger, maybe you're closer to having two academic, and that might make sense. But if you're an academic Rockstar, you know maybe somehow your internships or whatever, or volunteer community services. Maybe you want to professional. That's totally your call, but think about I don't want to call less experience a weakness, but given the averages and medians, the more work experience you have, that's the more it strengthens your application.

Right, so think about that. Those of you who are applying right from undergrad? You're not just you're not just competing with the entire applicant pool, but you're also competing with this subset of people who have replying right from undergrad, and so you need to think about how. How can you contribute.

In the classroom with people who are, you know, maybe 7-8 years in the military, or they're already in the foreign service or they've been working for their government. They're like mid level, maybe at a mofa to Japan or whatever the case may be, so that's how you need to think about how you're you're going to to compete among, and what your voice is and what is unique about you that you can bring to the table regardless.

Your lack of post grad experience a little bit philosophical, but hopefully that helps a little bit.

And we have a couple more minutes and I have a couple more questions, so let me keep plowing through these. UM, let's see Allie. How much is work experience weighed in the admissions process compared to grades, letters, etc etc? And I think I touched on that, so I will say that pretty much all the requirements are equal.

At first sight, right? Like they're all requirements for a reason, but then everybody will have different strengths and strengths and weaknesses. Sort of touched on the work experience. If you're coming right from undergrad, your internships will weigh much, much more heavily than you know. The internship of somebody who's been working in the Foreign Service and for many, many years, right? So we might it's very important back to connecting the dots, right? We want to see that this is maybe what you wanted to do your whole life. That's a little extreme.

You know, so ideally, even people who've been out for a very long time. We can look at their their extracurriculars, volunteer service, and their internships. But they will weigh much more heavily. For somebody who's younger. Another example might be thinking about recommendations. If you are not academically strong, right? If you have an academic weakness.

Your academic recommendations are going to weigh much more heavily, right then they would potentially otherwise. If you got perfect Jerry scores and 4.0's or whatever, so that's the kind of way you need to think about balancing your application. And one thing I will note a practical thing I will note is there is an opportunity to do additional information like documentation in your application, separate from your personal statement. Feel free to address these things if there is.

Like a weakness, a gap in your resume, terrible grem or GPA. Those are common things that people will say hey, this doesn't reflect who I am and what my strengths are so you know we'll see that stuff. So if there's a reason behind it, you don't want us making up the answers or asking. You know, when we asked the why, you're not there to answer it. So try to answer that upfront in your application so we don't make up stories on on why you know.

Blue something so feel free to do those kinds of things. If you you know. Again, like maybe maybe somebody started their undergraduate degree in a major that was.

Pretty ******** and they decided they really had no interest in and that obviously tanked their GPA and then you recovered that, so there's lots of stories like that that happened so.

Again, I'm getting philosophical with the last two minutes left, but I hope I usually find that those are the kinds of things that people are really kind of wanting to know. 'cause there's usually no hard black and white answer, so I'm looking for looking some extracurricular activities like the Carrie Fellows. What other extracurriculars are there to enhance the MP in our time attacks? And yes, that is a great question. There are number of student organizations I find that link really quickly pasted.

In some you know there's the Jackson salon. Jackson women do something and the nice thing is we are again becoming a school. Some of the things we're we're building from the ground up. We're starting, you know, DEI initiatives at student government, so there's lots of things like that to get involved with at Jackson. And you know, the salon and the global affair. Things that you're actually bringing your expertise right. Weekly meeting where Jackson will pay for the pizza or food.

Or whatever and and you get together and somebody doesn't is designated to share their expertise of what they've been doing before they came to Jackson. So there's a lot of that stuff even in COVID times, and we had a tent Outback and there was pumpkin carving, and, you know, silly, fun. Things like that. Or just people. WhatsApp in each other and say, hey, let's go for a bike ride on the Farmington Trail. So there's. There's a whole lot. And then there's being involved with the centers yet.

Wide Size City is a common TS AI side city. A lot of our Jackson students are involved with planning conferences for them and being involved in that research and whatnot. So lots of lots of opportunities and OK. Matthew Matthews like who. I'm a math major. Yeah, you're golden.

Or I'll see language certificates, accepted. Goodness gracious. I don't know the answer to that. So there is a question in the application about what your language background is. Maybe your levels, which you've done.

It seems pretty robust. We aren't going to refer back to that if you get admitted and enroll, you will. Still, you know our Student Affairs Office will review everything or you'll have to take a proficiency exam, but.

It's really, uhm, it's helpful for us on the front end. We have student affairs, people on our admissions committee so to know, sort of where you think you're at in your language level to see how you think you're going to meet the requirements. But as far as the technical stuff that's handled by student affairs.

Uhm, they look at all of that and determine where you land. And I don't know if there's anything on our website about that, but if you do need to know that sooner rather than later, feel free to email Jackson admissions and we can pass that along. But otherwise, just we need to in the application process. Get an idea of where you think you are based on, whether it's your coursework or your professional experience with language and whatnot. So I'm sorry I don't know the actual.

Answer Whether it's ILC or CFR, I don't know the answer to that. Again, feel free to email us if you need to know, but I don't think it's anything you'll need to know from an application standpoint, but mention that feel free to mention that's will want to know that those are the certificates that you've done, 'cause somebody on the admissions committee will probably know the details of what all that language stuff means. OK, it's 103, we're not getting cutoff. I see a couple more questions. I am. I know, we've lost a bunch of people.

Hopefully not because of my rambling, but hopefully because they had to pop off at the hour, but I'm happy to answer these last couple questions before I caught off node and is asking to add on my years of experience question what sorts of jobs feels to Yale admitted students come with.

Great question. I usually just to point because it's so broad. I will point back to our student BIOS. People are coming ideally from some form of public policy international relations field. You'll be able to see that in the student BIOS. The link that I posted before, and basically if you look at a lot of the the summer internship the you know the summer experience and the first jobs.

That people take. It's a lot of that as well. The you know these are students or just getting them in sort of higher level or different levels in these courts. But they're coming from, you know nonprofits. They're coming from peace core. They're coming from.

Doing refugee work, they're coming from all over the world, so as long as there's that commitment to the global good.

And you can make a case for you know why you need it such a flexible degree like this where you create your own curriculum then that's that's really what we're looking for. So and how? What's your unique story? I hadn't mentioned that before, but it's really about your unique story as well.

I think I mentioned it indirectly as far as what you bring to the table, but.

We do a really good job at bringing in 35 different unique stories, so hopefully that helps a little bit or Nestor. What should I tell my professional recommender dimension? You know, hopefully.

They know you. They know what you want to do. Hopefully you've told them why you're applying to Jackson and Yale and why you want a global affairs program, and hopefully they know what your long term goals are, and you know if you can give them a little bit of information about a lot of people give their personal statements to their recommenders. Hopefully your recommender will familiarize themselves with Jackson or Yale and and can sort of make that.

You know comparison of why they think.

You are a good fit for us, right? So, UM, trust me. Probably 10s of thousands of recommendations in my lifetime. And they, they're all very different. You just want to choose somebody who knows you, well, you know a one paragraph letter from a high ranking official is not necessarily good letter. It's not about the names, it's really about people who know you well and know how you can contribute to a Graduate School cohort.

That appears to be my last question, which is good 'cause we've lost half our attendees and it's well after one so I will say thank you thanks to you who were holding on to the end. Hopefully you found this helpful. Most of these webinars are pretty much the same thing, but there's very different questions that come up, so feel free to attend others. Annie, I may ask, laughed will try to address some of them as specific questions.

Keep an eye on our calendar. If you're local and you know maybe we'll have some in person visits this fall, but hopefully we'll see your application, so thanks for bearing with me as I've been settling in after 18 months and getting back into the groove of this. You know, working in person things so, but glad to be with you virtually so good luck and again, hopefully will see your applications sometime soon. Take care, bye.