Jordan Graham

Students who start a Master of Public Policy (MPP) degree at Harris are challenged to hit the ground running—and I wouldn’t want it any other way.

Only a week into the program, my classes are churning through material, my calendar is jam-packed with new opportunities, and each day I’m meeting more of the diverse group of students who I now call classmates.

Here’s a rundown of what I’ve done so far:

Completed Math Camp

Math Camp was a fitting start to kick off a Harris degree. The pre-term course rapidly prepared me for the courses I am now taking. Math Camp gave me a solid foundation to begin the core in the MPP program. I also attended other pre-term courses Harris offered, including one series that introduced the fundamentals of coding and one that showcased the breadth of services offered by the school’s Career Development Office.

The best part, though, was meeting the other students who attended Math Camp. We studied together. We hung out at the bar together. And in a few short weeks, I was friendly with students from around the nation and globe, all with different life stories and perspectives, and all with dreams of making the world a better place.

Sought On-Campus Opportunities

The University of Chicago has so much more to offer than I anticipated. Within the first two weeks of being on campus, I have:

  • Became a member of the Student Advisor Board for The Projection on Political Reform
  • Joined the Harris Energy and Environmental Association
  • Attended events at David Axelrod’s Institute of Politics
  • Registered to hear Democratic presidential candidate Pete Buttigieg speak
  • Signed up for an upcoming conference to network with consulting firms
  • Considered research assistant positions
  • Met with my academic advisor
  • Signed up for a weekly yoga class
  • Committed to helping form a co-ed Harris intramural basketball team

I’m trying out as much as my schedule allows in order to get a taste of the many opportunities the University of Chicago provides.

Found an On-Campus Job

After working as a newspaper journalist for six years in Orange County, California, I moved back to Chicago in the spring. When I arrived, I reached out to Harris to see if the school had any employment opportunities for an incoming student. I ended up landing a job with the Student Recruitment and Global Outreach office, where I called prospective students, helped lead campus visits, and wrote profiles on students and alumni. Now that the first quarter has begun, SRGO has encouraged me to scale back my workload to focus on classes. Several of my classmates also have landed jobs at Harris, helping us ease the burden of transitioning from the workforce.

Entered “The Core”

Harris students start their academic career with “The Core”—classes in microeconomics, statistics, and analytical politics— all of which give me the tools I need to start a career in public policy. These classes progress quickly, but many professors structure the assignments to be tackled in groups, which makes it much less daunting. Some students come from liberal arts disciplines, some studied math, and others can write computer code in their sleep. That balance helps ensure everyone is up to speed as we plunge head-first into a new chapter.

Attended Welcome Week

Harris’s “Welcome Week” for incoming students offered fun and meaningful opportunities to meet new classmates. That included trolley tours around Chicago, a campus-wide bar crawl, in-depth discussions of our class’s common read, Just Mercy by Bryan Stevenson, diversity training sessions, and speeches from local and national policy experts. It also included an Academic Year Kick-Off boat cruise, where hundreds of students danced for a full two hours below the deck of a massive yacht on Lake Michigan in the middle of a lightning storm—and I can’t think of a better representation of the excitement and energy to come as a Harris student.

Home