Accepted and Attending 2008

Colleges and Universities A-Z McGill University
21

<p>before you go on your narrow "it doesnt matter in america, so therefore it doesnt matter at all" rant, mcgill has been ranked worldwide. second and third tier schools like uconn or pennstate may hold repuation here (although mainly because of their size), but on a universal level that just doesnt hold. in no way am i putting down those schools at all (i even applied and was accepted to pennstate), but trying to make that comparison is grasping at straws.</p>

<p>you may feel that canada is, in effect, of little importance compared to america and that as a result this means their universities are unimportant an at a skewed academic level in comparison to ours. but i think you need to look at the facts, for example consider the ACT scores mentioned earlier. mcgill's is a 30, whereas penn state's 75th percentile isnt even that high. </p>

<p>and if you were well-researched enough to actually back your asinine views, canadian culture typically holds higher education at a different level than the typical american student--therefore less focus on the "college experience" and more on seriously working towards an excellent academic preparation for one's career. </p>

<p>if you still arent convinced, take a look at collegeboard's mcgill pages. the majority of other students who view that page have also looked at harvard, nyu, cornell, etc.</p>

22

<p>I have to agree with everyone that you can't really compare McGill to Penn State or Uconn. I applied to McGill and also to Columbia, Cornell, NYU, and UPenn. I never even considered colleges like Penn State, UConn or Fordham and I live in New York.</p>

23

<p>^Agreed. My college list includes Johns Hopkins, Rice, Carnegie Mellon, and a few safeties like Georgia Tech and St. Andrews (Scotland), but my #1 choice at this point is McGill. I was urged to not apply to schools such as UConn or Pennstate by my college conselor, not only because they're BEYOND safeties, but because they're rather sub par academically. </p>

<p>In other words: the average student at McGill could gain admittance to schools such as Uconn and maintain a 4.0 with ease.</p>

24

<p>(Kids that go to UCONN, academically speaking, are some of the farthest away from being omniscient)</p>

<p>Okay, first off, Omniscient, what make you think that America's opinion is the greatest in the world (I am American and I'll say most Americans seem to be really stupid when it comes to education)</p>

<p>The average american will go to Random Public Garbage University, and there, he gets a 4 year education, only equal to four years of highschool. So in total, like 8 years of high school.(4 hs, and 4 wasted years at a crappy university that teaches hs level stuff).
Americans don't even know what it means to be "educated". </p>

<p>One point I would like to bring up is that I don't know a single person who has gone to UCONN, or knows anything about it. I could find millions of people who would say they "know the school", but the only reason really is that Conneticut, a state that every American is familiar with because of its name, is in the name of UCONN. So when someone hears the word UCONN, they automatically think "That school is in Conneticut".</p>

<p>With McGill, much less people seem to have heard of it, simply because its name doesnt have a place in it or anything familiar. However, truly educated men, especially professors and such, highly regard McGill as an institution of higher learning. Not only that, but 99% of the time, they will have great reasons.</p>

<p>Ask any Berkeley chemistry professor what they thought about McGill, if they didnt know anything about it, they'd probably lose their job (Ernest Rutherford, perhaps the most important scientist in the field of chemistry ever, did all his work at McGill)</p>

<p>And another point. Go to England. Ask someone about McGill and UCONN. McGill will always get the nod as the better school.
Go to any part of europe and the same will happen.
Go throughout asia and oceania, the same consensus will be help.</p>

<p>And why are you here on these forums. Go away! simple as that. Nobody likes you being on a forum that you come to harass people about a better school.</p>

25

<p>^^^ very well put.</p>

<p>Look, UConn is not a bad school, but it by no means is one with the academic merit and tradition found at McGill. Just by looking at each school's alumni, you can clearly see that a mediocre public school in the US cannot compare to McGill. How many nobel prize winners does Uconn have? 0. McGill? 7
McGill also has produced 128 rhodes scholars; I don't even think UConn has one. McGill's endowment is over 3 times as large as UConn's, and Canadian schools generally are supposed to have lower endowment figures. Thus, unless you present a convincing case as to why UConn is significantly better than McGill, your analysis remains deeply flawed.</p>

26

<p>well i dont think he'll be back here any time soon</p>

27

<p>Not to interrupt this highly competitive debate (sarcasm intended), but I think the best way to conclude where McGill stands among US universities is if all McGill applicants on this forum to rank where McGill would stand among the other colleges they applied to. Feel free to rank based on personal preference. </p>

<p>I personally would rank them in this order:
1) Columbia, 1) Cornell,
3) Princeton,
4) NYU,
5) Georgetown
6) McGill
7) Fordham 7) SUNY Binghamton 7) American University
10) SUNY Stony Brook</p>

<p>Objectively (although this is not an objective process, so I would consider this irrelevant; I have my own reasons for ranking the way I did):
1) Princeton (pending)
2) Columbia (pending)
3) Cornell (pending)
4) Georgetown (pending)
5) NYU (pending)
6) McGill (accepted)
7) Fordham (accepted)
8) American (pending)
9) Binghamton (accepted)
10) Stony Brook (accepted)</p>

28

<p>I'd put McGill above NYU; probably tied with Georgetown. Agree with the rest though.</p>

29

<p>The whole "debate" was started by an ignorant someone who decided to go on a tangent in an acceptance thread about the rankings of mcgill. Look, your argument attacked people who believe that Mcgill is the Harvard of Canada. If you can read, then you should be able to conclude that no one is saying that Mcgill is as good as Harvard; the statement doesn't compare Mcgill to ANY schools in the US, but only in Canada. If someone says tiger woods is the babe ruth of baseball, are you going to go on a rant about tiger being worse than ruth in baseball??? (excuse the example, not exactly a sports advocate) @@ damn, get your analogy ability together.</p>

30

<p>i got accepted to science and engineering... but i dont know yet if i am going to be attending, i need to hear back from 10 other colleges =/</p>

31

<p>"but honestly, who cares about Canada besides Canadians?! Wow, the best school in one of the most uneventful countries in the world! You rely on America for almost everything, and expect an American to admire a school from that country? Are you nuts?!"</p>

<p>Omniscient1, you belong in a US school. YOU ARE the "ugly American" and certainly shouldn't represent us in another country.</p>

32

<p>Well put!^^^hahaha</p>

<p>BTW, he goes to UCONN.</p>

<p>So here's what I think happened. 1st off, he doesnt know like anything about McGill.
I am assuming, by looking at his previous posts, most of which have to do with UCONN, that omniscient comes on to college confidential, goes to search, and types in UCONN to see if anything new and interesting comes up.</p>

<p>When he sees some school he's never heard of being called better than UCONN, he freaks out and has to defend his school (in this case, by saying a school is worse than UCONN, even though in reality, he perhaps doesnt know a thing about McGill, and McGill is in fact much better than UCONN).</p>

33

<p>To the kid who ranked McGill above NYU...If only you could see me. What makes NYU better than McGill? What makes Georgetown better than McGill?</p>

<p>The grossest part about all of this, is that most of you have been brainwashed about how education works. Most people assume the greater the endowment the greater the education, when that's just obviously not true. Sit in on a lecture at McGill, sit in at a lecture at any other name brand university. Watch a video lecture at McGill, watch an MIT opencourse lecture, compare the goods yourself, you might be surprised. </p>

<p>For the sticker price, location, and campus pride (aka, very little ego), McGill is a knock out deal. The only catch is the 4 year weed out. </p>

<p>If you can make it out alive, you'll get a top-tier education. If you can't, you'll most likely either a) transfer out, b) kill yourself, or c) not get an diploma at all. </p>

<p>Also, when people say UConn, I think Yukon the canadian province. Just as a tid-bit there. Not many people from my high school or geographically area were really hopping to get to UConn, let alone Connecticut (a few kids had Yale-dreams, though). Let's face it, when your state school is better known regionally, why would you pay out-of-state tuition to go to a p.o.s., unknown statey?...it just makes no sense.</p>

34

<p>How many freshman stay for their second year u suppose?</p>

<p>Do kids drop out left and right first year?</p>

35

<p>I'm not going to try to rank McGill next to any other school, because it's impossible, and more importantly, irrelevant. Honestly, who gives a ****. I'm having a great time at McGill, it's very inexpensive compared to every US school I got into, and I'm not in the least worried about finding a good job once I graduate.</p>

<p>If you think McGill students, or any Canadians for that matter, walk around with the mentality that McGill is the Harvard of Canada, you're misinformed. Canadians don't get caught up in the "college craze," which is probably why you don't find many Canadians on this forum. Just look at the application process. All Canadians have to do is send in their high school transcript. In general, people at McGill are the most down to earth individuals I've ever known. </p>

<p>If you go to the McGill bookstore, you'll find shirts that say "Harvard: America's McGill." It's a joke. It's even more humorous because there are actually people (on this forum) who are rattled by this. </p>

<p>People on this forum are too caught up in numbers. Choose a college/university that makes sense for YOU, or you'll regret it. I have friends that left McGill after the first semester for a variety of reasons from weather to not being able to handle independent life. It doesn't mean McGill is bad.</p>

<p>I'm not even really backing up McGill; it doesn't bother me what other people's opinions are. It is what it is, and I love it.</p>

36

<p>BIGTWIX: Out of my floor at rez of 30, 1 dropped. I only know of one other person who did. I'm sure there were more in my rez, but people certainly don't drop like flies. I think the highest drop rate is Quebec students.</p>

37

<p>ahahaha I'm so getting that t-shirt :)</p>

38

<p>^exactly what i thought... mcgill doesn't seem to have a shop though online :(</p>

39

<p>Well, thanks for clarifying that up, hss07. And here I was privately wondering how the hell these people could seriously equate McGill with Harvard. (To me, that was a huge turnoff- a school trying to be like another). It's good to know that even McGill takes its comparison with Harvard as a joke. (It's not really that funny, though, but w/e
) I am much more likely to go now.</p>

40

<p>wow... bringhamtonrocks.. for the last time, no one except for YOU made the assumption that people equate McGill with Harvard. analogies my friend, learn them and love them. ok i guess that's all settled now.</p>