Hey there! I’m Kaneisha Grayson. I’m an MPA & MBA alumna of Harvard Kennedy School and Harvard Business School. Since founding this business from my HBS on-campus apartment in 2010, I have spent 12+ years leading a consultant team that has helped 100+ paid clients successfully apply to Harvard Kennedy School.
Below is some clear, actionable advice to help guide you as you work on your 2022 Harvard Kennedy School application.
Looking for essay advice? Read our blog post: Harvard Kennedy School 2022 Essay Advice
Harvard Kennedy School does not have a minimum required GPA for admission.
The most competitive applicants to Harvard Kennedy School have an undergraduate GPA of 3.6 or above.
If your undergraduate GPA is 3.4 or below, or if you have several C’s, D’s, F’s, or W’s, I suggest you write the optional essay to explain your low grades and reassure the Harvard Kennedy School admissions committee that you are prepared for the rigors of the Harvard Kennedy School classroom.
Among our paying clients who were admitted to Harvard Kennedy School, the lowest GPA of an admitted applicant was slightly below 2.5. That client worked with us for the 2021 application season.
Click here to read our articles on writing the Harvard Kennedy School optional essay:
There is no required GRE or GMAT score for Harvard Kennedy School.
The GRE nor the GMAT is required for the Mid-Career MPA program. However, the GRE or the GMAT is required for all of the two-year programs such as the MPP, MPA-ID, and two-year MPA program.
Read our post about GRE scores of some of our clients who were admitted to Harvard Kennedy School.
Check out our Reviews and Testimonials page. You can see the GRE and GMAT scores of our clients who were admitted to Harvard Kennedy School.
How we help if you are a client:
For each of our Application Accelerator® and Hourly Coaching clients, we give them a customized test score to aim for based on their particular demographic, academic, and professional profile. That way, they know the minimum score they should aim for and don’t waste time trying to get a sky-high score if they don’t need one.
Each degree program has its own list of prerequisites for admission. For example, for the MPP the pre-requisites are a Bachelor’s degree and some knowledge of college-level economics, statistics, and calculus is preferred. They also prefer 2-3 years of full-time professional work experience, but there’s no hard line saying that you absolutely must have full-time professional work experience.
If you are currently in college and think you may want to pursue a policy or business degree in the future, I suggest you take Statistics, Microeconomics, and Calculus while you are still in college.
If you have already finished college, you can take supplemental courses online or at your local community college before applying.
The prerequisites for the other degree programs are more detailed, so be sure to know what they are and give yourself enough time to meet them.
Click here for a list of prerequisites for Harvard Kennedy School degrees.
How we help if you are a client:
Even if you’ve met the official prerequisites for Harvard Kennedy School, there may still be specific actions you can take to strengthen your particular academic profile. Each client in our Application Accelerator® and Hourly Coaching programs has a Game Plan Call where we suggest specific supplemental courses they should take to strengthen their profile. We don’t just tell you which courses to take; we tell you when to take them as well, so that you can balance which courses to take before you apply, and which courses you can take after you apply.
Choose your three recommenders wisely and make sure they are prepared to write you stellar recommendations.
For MPP applicants, I recommend you having 1-2 professional recommendations, an academic recommendation, and perhaps a recommendation from someone who has supervised you in a public service / volunteer / nonprofit capacity.
Make sure your recommenders know what your degree program is, what qualities HKS is looking for in a candidate, and that they are able to cite specific examples and stories to back up their recommendations of you.
How we help if you are a client:
We are available to edit letters of recommendation if your recommender wants their letter edited or if you have been put in the position of having to write your own letter of recommendation. We do not write letters of recommendation for clients.
During the Game Plan Call (first call after you are a paying client), your Game Plan Coach will help you choose the three best people to serve as recommenders for you. Application Accelerator® and Hourly Coaching clients have access to a recommender packet template and sample letters or recommendation.
You want your essays, resume, short answer responses, and letters of recommendation to highlight the personal, professional, and academic qualities that Harvard Kennedy School values in its applicants.
The qualities that Harvard Kennedy School would like to see highlighted in your application are the following:
How we help if you are a client:
Potential Application Accelerator® and Hourly Coaching clients are invited to an hour-long Breakthrough Call after their Quick Call.
During the Breakthrough Call, our Breakthrough Coach team will ask you in-depth questions about your personal, academic, and professional background.
The Breakthrough Coach will then verbally summarize their understanding of your profile and your story in a 4-minute recap.
They then pass the recording of that recap on to your dedicated consultant so that your consultant has that context to help you highlight your strengths and your full personal, professional, and academic story throughout your application.
It can be a little confusing keeping all of HKS’ degree programs straight. There’s the MPP, MPA, MC/MPA, MC/MPA Mason Fellows, MPA-ID, and PhDs.
Then, there are all the joint degrees and concurrent degrees to keep track of as well!
While at Harvard Kennedy School, I had friends in every program, and while we are all students at the same school with access to almost all of the same courses, you can have very different academic experiences depending on your degree program.
How we help if you are a client:
Our clients usually know which degree at HKS they want to apply to. However, if there is any confusion about which degree you should apply to, you can ask your dedicated consultant for their advice, submit the question during a group coaching call, or submit it to our private clients-only Q&A Vault.
Some helpful hints on figuring out if you should apply to the MPP or MPA progam at HKS:
Obviously, you should read up on each of the degree programs yourself, speak to current students, have informational interviews with recent alumni, attend admissions events, and decide which Harvard Kennedy School degree is the right for your profile and goals.
The Harvard Kennedy School MPP is the Master in Public Policy degree. The MPP is the most popular degree at Harvard Kennedy School. The HKS MPP has the largest graduating class size of all the degree programs. It is a two-year program with one full year of core classes (one elective each semester) and then all electives the second year.
The MPA (the HKS degree that I have) is the Master in Public Administration. It is also a 2-year program, but is all electives. The MPA is now primarily for non-Harvard concurrent degree students (such as Wharton MBAs, Tuck MBAs, and MIT MBAs) and/or established professionals who already have a Masters in a field that closely resembles MPP coursework.
The Harvard Kennedy School Mid-Career MPA is an all-elective one-year program for professionals with extensive work experience. You must have at least seven years of full-time work experience, but the most competitive applicants usually have 14 years or more of full-time work experience.
The Mid-Career MPA Mason Fellows program is for established professionals from developing and transitional economies.
You might be unsure if you should apply via the standard Mid-Career MPA or the Mason Fellows program. You aren’t alone!
The Harvard Kennedy School MPA-ID is intense and highly focused on (you guessed it) international development and economics. Applicants should pay close attention that they fully meet all of the prerequisites for the HKS MPA-ID.
In my company’s experience helping people apply to various degrees, it can be more difficult for a highly competitive applicant to get into the HKS MPA-ID than to even be admitted to Harvard Business School.
Story Time: On several occasions, I have advised joint degree applicants to apply to the MPP rather than the MPA-ID, and they have been admitted to the MBA at HBS but not to the MPA-ID at HKS. I don’t share this to discourage interested and eligible applicants from applying to the MPA-ID. I just urge you to not simply look at the phrase “international development,” and think, “I would love to spend two years focused on international development. That must be the degree for me,” and put yourself at a disadvantage if you are not a strong fit for the program.
In your essays and resume, make it very easy for the Adcom to understand why HKS is a great fit for you academically, personally, and professionally.
Connect your academic background to the specific coursework you’ll take at HKS.
Explain the preparation you’ve had thus far that will help you be successful at HKS, the gaps in your education that you plan to fill at HKS, and cite specific courses at HKS that you plan on taking to gain the knowledge you need to move forward in your career.
HKS has a collegial and tight-knit culture. Research the extracurricular activities of the school, and learn about some of the activities you plan to engage in (especially if you plan to be a leader in one of the clubs), and discuss how those will be an important part of your experience if admitted.
Most importantly, discuss your professional experiences thus far and how they have prepared you for making the most of your time at HKS.
How we help if you are a client:
Whether you are an Application Accelerator®, Hourly Coaching, or Editing Services client, our team will help you figure out which of your stories are the most compelling to the Admissions Committee. Then, once you have a first draft, we will help you polish that draft from good to great over several rounds of revision.
Application Accelerator® and Hourly Coaching clients have access to 100+ sample essays and resumes. They can also have their materials live edited during group coaching calls, and learn from the editing and coaching other clients receive during those group coaching calls.
Harvard Kennedy School is a professional school. This means that its primary purpose is to prepare people to be leaders in their respective professional fields. The goal is not to pump out a bunch of academics (besides the PhD candidates). Therefore, you need to be able to articulate clearly why you need to attend HKS at this time to achieve your immediate, mid-term, and long-term professional goals. You need to have a clear vision for your career and a map for how HKS can help you achieve that vision. If the Adcom can’t figure out the specific, measurable impact you plan to achieve after leaving HKS, it’s hard for them to give you one of the spots in the class.
How we help if you are a client:
We stress test the stated career goals of all of our clients. We help make sure that our clients’ career goals are clearly articulated rather than vague and trite. We also make sure that our clients’ career paths are sufficiently ambitious while also being realistic and compelling to the Admissions Committee.
Read about the research centers, classes, extracurricular activities, leadership programs, and fellowship programs. SO FEW PEOPLE DO A GOOD JOB OF THIS. If you take the time to read about and understand the various research centers, career resources, courses, and extracurricular activities available at HKS, and then identify the ones that are good fits for you in your application, connecting them all together with your career vision, and your past experiences, you will present a compelling and cohesive case for why you should be admitted.
How we help if you are a client:
You often don’t know what you don’t know. Your dedicated consultant can give you insight into their own experience at Harvard Kennedy School, answer questions you have about what it’s like to be an HKS student and alum, and make suggestions of things you should research further. By having a dedicated consultant who went to Harvard Kennedy School and has helped other applicants such as yourself get into HKS, you can shortcut the extensive process of researching the school from scratch.
For example, below is a little information about my specific experience at HKS. Each HKS-specific resource is highlighted in bold. The excerpt written below is included to show how many resources there are at HKS to motivate you to do some research, and to demonstrate how specific you should be in your application essays in terms of the ways that the HKS degree will benefit you.
While at HKS, I was involved with a number of extracurricular activities and really loved my classes. Some of my favorite classes were Arts of Communication, Agribusiness, Entrepreneurship in the Social Sector, Public Narrative, and Followership. While I was not required to do a thesis to graduate, I did complete a Reading and Research project about Black women and digital entrepreneurship which also tied in nicely with my course Leadership for a Networked World. I was a Women in the Oval Office program participant, which was offered by the Women and Public Policy Program. I also learned a tremendous amount and really enjoyed being a George Leadership Fellow, which is a part of the Center for Public Leadership. I was active in the African and African Diaspora Collaborative (AADC), and attended many of the speeches held in The Forum by the Institute of Politics.
That’s just a taste of the many, many resources at HKS. Show the Adcom that you really intend to go to HKS if admitted, and let them know about the kinds of things you’ll be involved in.
How we help if you are a client:
When editing your essays, our team will ask you lots of probing questions to make sure that you never waste an opportunity to show how strong of a fit for HKS you are. We remove extraneous information that eats up valuable word count of your essay, and help make sure that every word of your essay counts.
Application Accelerator® and Hourly Coaching clients have access to 100+ sample essays and resumes. They can also have their materials live edited during group coaching calls, and learn from the editing and coaching other clients receive during those group coaching calls.
Here is a list of HKS courses.
Throughout the year, HKS admissions officers will travel around the country providing information about the school and the application process. Now that we live in a post-pandemic world, there are a plethora of online admissions events as well.
Check to see when the Harvard Kennedy School admissions representatives are coming to your area and be sure to attend the events. The Adcom members do remember people that they meet and interact with at these events. Attending these events provides an opportunity to make an impression, get some great information, and meet other people in your area who are applying.
Attending virtual events are an excellent and convenient way to learn more, connect with the admissions committee, and ask your questions.
Here is the calendar for the admissions events.
You can’t get into a school if you miss the deadline! Make sure that you are 100% clear on when the application for your degree program and any fellowships to which you are applying are due.
The HKS deadline is usually in early December, but it has been as early as late November in some years.
The Harvard Kennedy School application deadline is Thursday, December 1, 2022 at 3 pm Eastern Time.
How we help if you are a client:
Our dedicated consultants help our Application Accelerator® and Hourly Coaching clients stay on track with all the moving parts of the application process. Each client has a private client portal where they can assign themselves to-dos with deadlines and notes, and exchange messages with their consultant.
Having missing materials is not only annoying to the Adcom, it could mean the kiss of death for your application. Get organized and make sure you have all the necessary parts of the application.
The requirements fall into the following categories (hyperlinked to the official Harvard Kennedy School admissions website with the exact information you need):
Harvard Kennedy School has lots of fellowship money available, but lots of people get admitted with only loans as their financial aid. You can keep your student debt as low as possible by applying for as many fellowships as possible that you are a good fit for.
The Center for Public Leadership has lots of full scholarships that are highly competitive and require a separate application.
How we help if you are a client:
We don’t search for scholarships and fellowships for our clients. However, we help our clients apply to the dozens of Harvard Kennedy School fellowships for which they are eligible by editing their essays to make sure they don’t give their scholarship applications less than their best effort. It can be exhausting to write and revise lots of scholarship essays after completing the entire HKS application, but it’s important to persist!
Get expert help with your application in The Art of Applying® Academy.
My team and I would love to help you with your Harvard Kennedy School application. Our Editing Services are available to help with:
If you sign up as an Application Accelerator® or Hourly Coaching client, we can help with all of the above and questions like:
Be sure to return to this post as you work on your Harvard Kennedy School application. My team and I will update this article with more tips, advice, and guidance as we approach the application deadline.
Thanks for this great advice! I’m looking to apply to HKS in the coming years and this will greatly guide my strategy in compiling the best application.
Hi Kaneisha,
My husband is planning to apply to HKS’s MPP. I think you would be a great person to speak with. Is it possible for us to connect via phone sometime? My email address is noted in this form. Looking forward to hearing from you. Thank you for all your help.
Hi Kaneisha!
This is great information!
I was wondering if you would be so kind to assist me on a question I’ve been wrestling with. I am applying for the MPP program this year and had a question on the recommendation letter. I’m about 2.5 years out of school and my strongest letters of recommendation are from supervisors at the two jobs I’ve been in. The online application does state that at least 1 academic recommendation letter is desirable however I do not have strong relationships with my professors. I do, however have one strong letter from a graduate student instruction who I interacted with closely and who even helped provide advice for a student run course I ran. I’ve heard that it is a big no-no to use letters from graduate student instructors – but what are your thoughts here? Should I:
1. Opt to have 3 professional letters
2. Do 2 professional letters and 1 graduate student instructor letter?
3. Do 2 professional letters and reach out to a completely different professor for a decent but not stellar recommendation letter?
Let me know- your thoughts are greatly appreciated!
Hi Kevin,
Considering how recently you graduated from college, I highly recommend you submit an academic letter of reference. If you really think you can’t get a strong letter from at least ONE of your professors, then go ahead and do Option 2 and use the graduate student instructor. You may want to address why you didn’t get a letter from one of your professors in your optional essay. Best of luck!
Hi Kaneisha,
Would it be okay to get 3 letters from professional supervisors if I’ve been out of school for 5 years? I realize having an academic reference is helpful for the admissions committee, but since I’ve been out of school and working professionally for that long, I feel like having professional letters of recommendation would make more relevant sense. Please let me know–many thanks!
Hi Sammy, I would not recommend three professional letters. Can you not get one of your letters from one of your community, volunteer, and/or leadership experiences? Three professional letters isn’t an application killer but it’s not ideal. Thanks for your question!
Wow! Thanks. This just puts everyone on a different level playing field altogether. Interesting!Hi Kaneisha,
Thank you for the wonderful source of information for the applicants. I had one question though – how important is prior public service work experience for getting into Mid-Career MPA program.
I have 9 years of work exp but all of it has been in private sector (management consulting). Will my application still be considered?
Hi Nalin, you are welcome! It is totally fine for all of your work experience to be in the private sector. However, you will need to demonstrate a commitment to public service through your extracurricular activities and community work as well as make a compelling argument in your essays why you need a policy degree to move forward in your career. Thanks for your question!
Hi Kaneisha,
Thanks for the great source of information! I’m struggling with choosing between the MPA2 program and MPP program – I have a Master’s degree in a related field that fulfills the MPA2 core, and 27 months of directly-related professional experience, in addition to 7 months as a a full-time international ESL teacher scholarship, and about 8 months of full-time professional internship experience at state government. Any insight from your perspective would be invaluable! Thanks!
Hi Rob, this is a question best asked of HKS admissions as you are really on the edge of having enough full-time work experience for the program. If your 7 months of full-time ESL teaching was after you graduated from college, I would count those toward your 27 months of professional experience. If your 8 months of internship experience is BEFORE you graduated from college, I wouldn’t necessarily count that as full-time work experience. My best recommendation to you if you can’t get an answer from HKS this close to the deadline (if you’re applying this year), is to just wait a year to apply when you will be undoubtedly qualified for the MPA2! I did the MPA2 program and really enjoyed the flexibility.
Hi, thanks for your information about HKS. i got 7.5 in IELTS . But I just got 6.5 in writing part, which does not meet the requirement of MPP this year. They require 7 in every subsection. I want to know whether they will still consider my admission based on my condition now.
Thanks for your attention.
Hi Catherine, this is a question best asked directly to HKS admissions. My advice is that you wait until you have the minimum IELTS score on each section before submitting your application. It is better to wait and apply when your application is strongest than it is to submit an application that does not meet minimum stated requirements and then have to reapply. Remember, those are application requirements; not suggestions. Best of luck in making your decision!
Thanks Kaneisha.
I am submitting my application in a couple of days. Your website has been a really useful tool. So I just want to thank you for all the useful information.
Best.
Hi Chun, I am so happy to hear that you’ve found my website such a useful tool! Best of luck on your application and please do let me know how it turns out!
Hi Kaneisha,
I am about to graduate from my university and would like to apply for the MPP program at the Kennedy school in the near future. It is clear to me that work experience is extremely important, but will someone be competitive if they apply with only one year of experience?
Hi Juan, there are people admitted every year (including some of our clients) who have 0 or just 1 year of full-time work experience. You will be much more competitive for admission (and for fellowships) with more work experience, but you can still be admitted with only one year of experience. I recommend you wait until you have 2-4 years of work experience before applying.
I am a qualified woman willing to apply to the Mason MPA program at HKS with ten year professional experience behind me in the non profit sector. Which financial aid could I apply for ? What is the process ?
Loved your article. I was wondering if you offered any consultation services and strategies for getting in the joint MBA/MPP program?
Thanks for the support, Shelley! I am Noah, a consultant with The Art of Applying. Hopefully, this is still helpful for you and someone else in that situation. Yes, we do offer consultation services and strategies for joint degree MBA/MPP programs! The following is a link to a recent Case Study of a former client who entered MBA/MPP program. When clients join our Application Accelerator, each person has an Assessment Call with our team. We listen to them to help create a list of potential schools that cater to their previous experiences and goals. In addition, we provide our clients with minimum, goal and target test scores to be sure they are competitive for their schools. We offer hourly coaching as well. While we don’t provide free 1:1 advice via our blog, we’d love to chat more with you about your application process, and how we can help. Here is the link to continue the conversation.
Hello Kaneisha,
I’m giving serious consideration to potentially persuing a degree from HKS (leaning towards MPD-ID).
I have achieved a satisfactory position of where I want to be in life at this time from various aspects (social, economic, etc.) and want to create a pathway for a new journey.
My motivation is now more so to give back and I believe HKS could be a good conduit in helping me to most leverage my desire as such. I prefer the Middle East/Asian Arenas – I could most effectively use my strengths in these parts of the world.
Question, my GPA is almost non existent from a competive comparison. However, I can run circles around most in business. I can obtain REAL attested letters of Rec from a past Fed Senator, VP, and a Kennedy Family member (specifics giving details and examples – not a rubber stamp) of all my talents and accomplishments.
Would this more than compensate for my GPA issue?
Best Regards,
Jeff
Hey Jeff! We apologize for the delay in our response. That’s great that you’re considering a MPD-ID from HKS! Unfortunately at this time we do not offer free advice through our blog. We do however suggest that you join our free Facebook group which has a community of individuals who are both applying to grad school as well as those who have already been accepted. We encourage you to ask your questions there and wish you the best of luck on your applications!
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