Maximizing the Johns Hopkins SAIS Experience

Photo caption: Seva (center) with her classmates in front of the Nitze Building at Johns Hopkins SAIS in Washington, DC.

Seva Karpauskaite
MA ’17
European and Eurasian Studies/Energy, Resources and Environment
First Year: SAIS Europe

During her final year as an undergraduate at Cambridge University, Seva started looking at graduate programs. One of her close friends was a Johns Hopkins SAIS alumna, who recalled her years in Bologna and Washington, DC with a lot of warmth and gratefulness and encouraged Seva to apply. Seva has enjoyed a very conceptual and philosophical nature of her undergraduate studies, but wanted to learn how to apply the theoretical knowledge practically, which made Johns Hopkins SAIS a perfect choice.

Seva took the advantage of the flexibility and breadth of the school’s educational curriculum, even if it means that her graduate degree is a mouthful to explain. In May she graduated with an MA in International Economics and International Relations as a dual concentrator in European and Eurasian Studies and Energy, Resources and Environment. She made a conscious effort to choose courses outside her comfort zone and was therefore able to study subjects that were entirely new to her, such as Economics, Finance and Energy Studies.

Seva’s graduate program has opened countless opportunities. As part of the ERE Practicum, she has been working as a student researcher at Toyota’s Government Affairs Office. She has also interned as a research assistant at the Center for Transatlantic Relations and at the Bologna Institute for Policy Research. In January she won Masdar’s Engage Global Competition and was invited to participate in one of largest gatherings on sustainability in the world, the Abu Dhabi Sustainability Week. Discussing environmental issues with leading experts and policy-makers was the best evidence of how much she learned during her graduate studies.

Seva continues to weigh her options between a career in academic scholarship or public policy. She would like to pursue a career where she could combine a rigorous analysis of the world with making a tangible difference, which is why she is so happy to have attended Johns Hopkins SAIS, where most of her professors are also impressive practitioners. Seva says they have been a constant source of inspiration and a stimulus to work hard and to discover new ways of thinking about the world.