Applying to SIPA as an International Student

As the School of International and Public Affairs, SIPA has always been a place where many cultures meet, and where coming from a foreign country actually means being in the majority. Out of around 1,300 students at SIPA, 60% are international students, coming from 92 countries and speaking 50+ native languages. In this post, I would like to give our international applicants some tips and tricks for preparing an application to SIPA.

Understanding local systems

Each year, the Admissions Committee reviews a very large volume of applications from international students. While the committee has a lot of experience with assessing and comparing different educational systems across countries, there is always more to know. For example, different countries use different grading systems, emphasize different skills, and even provide education for a different number of years. Therefore, if you feel that achieving a particular result or pursuing a particular path in your educational system is something unique in the system from which you come, feel free to mention it, and make the committee understand your story better.

Meeting application requirements

Applications to SIPA programs have a number of requirements, depending on the specific program. While some of these requirements can be met in various ways or offset in different parts of your application, others cannot. For example, fulfilling the language requirement for your SIPA application is a hard requirement. To be considered for admission, you will need to prove your language proficiency. This could be done either through providing an IELTS, TOEFL, or Cambridge English test score for the corresponding level, or through completing a bachelor’s degree that was taught entirely in English. Although special cases exist, ensuring that you have one of these is essential for your SIPA application. If you completed or are completing a bachelor’s degree taught in English, I would also recommend getting a confirmation from your university that the medium of instruction is English. If you will be sitting one of the language exams, I would advise doing so sooner rather than later, because one never knows when you have a bad day and fail the exam (disclosure: in high school, I failed an English proficiency test by a single point).

Translations

Many international students will be applying from countries where education is not in English, and where transcripts are only available in the local language. For these cases, we would require you to submit both the original and a translated version of your transcript and/or other relevant material. Because of that, it would be a good idea to make sure that you find some sort of translation service that is hopefully not too expensive and can get the job done. Translated documents are also important for third-party academic evaluations by services such as WES, and you will likely need those if you are admitted to SIPA.

Considering deadlines

Lastly, a good thing to do is to look at the Application Deadlines | Columbia SIPA and check what the best deadline to apply for would be. Usually, SIPA programs have two or even three deadlines, each with their own specifics. Applying for the earlier deadlines could give you a head start for visa and Columbia Residential applications, as well as more time to gather all necessary documents required after admission. Besides, earlier deadlines usually provide more options, such as the Early Action Deadline and the Fellowship Consideration deadline. I would definitely consider that!