Each year, CIPA selects several current Fellows to serve as Admissions Ambassadors for our program. Laya Hess-Skinner, a first-year Fellow concentrating in Economics and Financial Policy, can be reached at lah294@cornell.edu.
Hello! My name is Laya Hess-Skinner and I am a first year CIPA Fellow with a concentration in Economics and Financial Policy. Earlier in the academic year, I planned on concentrating in International Development, but I quickly realized that I needed more practical, quantitative skills for the type of work that I ultimately wanted to do. In particular, I hope to work with microfinance organizations in the Middle East, specifically Egypt, Jordan, Tunisia, and maybe one day, Syria.
I started my graduate school search with a regional and practical focus, and because of that, I wanted a program that allowed me the flexibility to do both. I applied to six other schools, and to be completely frank, only CIPA allowed me to intensively study Arabic (by the end of the program, I hope to have attained fluency) in addition to the concentration and core requirements. But because I was still on the fence, I reached out to a few current CIPA students and also visited. In fact, I’d highly suggest visiting Cornell– there’s only so much you can learn about a program from a website.
My time at CIPA has been academically rigorous, but rewarding: I’ve developed quantitative and language skills for future employment, commiserated over finals with my colleagues, and developed close friendships with people here. My one last piece of advice would be: bring a coat. Or three.
Great!
Nice.