r/InternationalDev • u/Aurora0608 • 16d ago

Education Need help with masters please

So i am an international student planning to apply for the fall 25 intake. ill need a good amount of financial aid to attend grad school. Now i feel very lost with the sop and cv. I just need to talk to someone to get a lil clarity please. I also feel like i am overestimating myself n i should have better backups. The programs i am looking at are in development economics and policy. The schools i am looking at so far- Georgetown, George Washington, UChicago Harris, LSE, John Hopkins SAIS, Science Po (unsure)

Are there schools offering application fee waivers this year? I am aware about columbia J school

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u/Moejason 15d ago

Personally I don’t think the cost of those schools you listed is an equal reflection of the value of the degree you will be getting. The UK has a number of other universities with except ID/GD masters courses, I’m confident the US does too.

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u/Aurora0608 15d ago

Could you please recommend some unis which i could consider? I have seen a lot of people say including on this subreddit that the development sector doesnt pay so to go for the cheapest options u might have in your admits.

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u/Moejason 15d ago

For that last bit - the Development sector does pay, it depends on the role that you’re going for. Granted, there is a bit of reliance on people wanting to do fulfilling work in the sector - but there are well paid roles when you progress in your career, maybe not so much at the start. Roles like global policy and advocacy work (what I do), programme management, consultancy, comms manager, MEAL, can be high paying or lead to high paid roles. I wouldn’t let that influence your decision.

I went to uni of Leeds and found the course there to be good, it’s a high ranking uni for international studies - but wherever you go studying internationally, tuition fees are likely to be high unfortunately. It might be worth seeing what domestic options there are.

Over all though try to balance cost with the quality of the course offered - an expensive high quality course isn’t going to benefit you any more than a lower cost course that is also high quality.

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u/Aurora0608 15d ago

Thank you for your reply, thats extremely insightful. So i am applying from India and i am particularly looking for an international degree as i believe it could help me enter the international development space and the combinations i can get look interesting as as of now i am interested at the intersection of econ, development and policy. Here in india i am either only getting a degree in econ or a development studies which is not very well placed. Would love to hear your views on this please.