<p>Hello everyone, I'm new here, and i would first just like to say nice to meet you.</p>
<p>Now there is something that i've been wondering about..... as you may know, in US high schools, any thing above 92% (or in some schools 90%) is considered an A, but in canada if you can get above an 80% that is already considered great. So if you get for example 94%, it would mean very different things in the two countries. In US, it would be A-, which is not that great, but in Canada it would be excellent. Do you think American universities know that?</p>
<p>and furthermore, in Canada the failing mark is 50% and in US it is around 64%, so there is a big difference. It doesn't mean Canada is easier, it is just that teachers mark harder. So would universities take that into consideration?</p>
<p>I remember hearing this question brought up at an ivy-information session held in Toronto. The Cornell admissions rep said that they understand that <em>most</em> Canadian high schools grade harder than in the US, and that they take this into consideration when you are applying. Apparently, they said that a 90 average from Ontario is considered excellent.
(Note: I wasn't actually at the info session when this question was asked, this is just what I have heard ~ therefore I might be wrong).</p>
<p>i was at that session held at marriott eaton hotel, yeah, they said anything above an 80% is great, and anything above 90% i excellent.
i remember so many chinese "scholars" at that meeting.
it was scary, i was surrounded by nerds</p>
<p>you know, i wonder sometimes if everyone on this site is chinese. (well not everyone but the majority). I would make a poll thingy if i could, but i don't know how. lol</p>
<p>hey newbyreborn, do you remember whether they said 90 is excellent in general, or did they distinguish between subjects eg social science subjects vs math/science? thanks in advance</p>
<p>I've been told by a student at Dartmouth (New Hampshire, not Nova Scotia) that the American Ivy League admission officers give us canadians an automatic boost from 5-10%. Who knows if it's true tho. (She says she was told someone who has something to do with admissions lol)</p>
<p>Wouldn't matter. You still would require a 95+% without some extraordinary "hook", assuming that you're the average applicant in order to be competitive for the upper Ivies.</p>
<p>yes. they do look at it differently. The last time I went to an ivy league meeting they definitely confirmed us that they know that a 90% here is of different value than 90% in the states.</p>
<p>Differently sure, but 90% won't even guarantee you admission into any program that you want in Canada even as a Canadian resident.</p>
<p>By comparison, Canadian institutes are vastly more easy to gain admission into for Canadian residents than the top ten institutions in the United States.</p>
<p>Keeping that in perspective, 90% isn't sufficient in most cases - unless, of course, an exceptional "hook".</p>
<p>i think the percentage is somewhat depending on which schools you go to. some schools have inflated grades, however even though the universities know, they say we understand the circumstances, however there isn't a way around this issue, so if they don't qualify, the freshman year will wash them away. My mom called U of T admission and that's what they say. If you find the marking unfair at schools, move to another school. (those people, ruthless)</p>
<p>A 90% in a Canadian school is much more difficult to achieve than a 90% in an American school. </p>
<p>90%+ (along with 1400+ SATs and good ecs) from a Canadian high school is competitive enough for Ivies like UPenn, Columbia, Dartmouth, Brown and Cornell, while you'll probably need 93%+ to be competitive at HYP...</p>
<p>How exactly do Canadian teachers "mark harder"? I'm a Canadian, so I would like to know. For an entirely objective non-opinionated subject like math, it must be the more difficult curriculum, right? Unless Canadian teachers are instructed to be total jerks with C's that look like D's on multiple choice tests, or 6's that look like 0's, there's no room for subjectivity. Even in a subject like English, how much can the teachers differ? Are all Canadian English teachers poet laureates, while American ones are tabloid trash? So it must be the curriculum.</p>
<p>The American curriculum confuses me. In Canada, you have science, math, social studies, etc. Then you get to grade 11 or 12, then you start to branch off into bio, history, geography, calculus, etc. But in the U.S., you have all these specific courses starting very early in high school, while in Canada, we have more generalized ones.</p>
<p>Some of my friends in the US report that their high school teachers curve heavily in math and science courses. Since I've never encountered any of that here (alas!), maybe that accounts for some of the difference?</p>
<p>nbachris2788 let me explain to you how math can be very subjective!
at our school, 35%/70% of final grade is knowledge (and then 30% exam), so that's the objective part. now, the rest of the 35% turns in to 15% application (subjective), 10% STSE (society crap, which also require lots of communication therefore, it's subjective) and finally 10% Communication (which is written paragraphs, extremely subjective). Our math classes are nothing like numbers. One can score perfect on numbers, but only an 80% max on the whole evaluation.<br>
and this isn't the scary part, math is the class require least communication and subjectivity. Our physics, chemistry and biology classes are even more based on subjectivity. Knowledge only counts for 30%/70% in those classes. So, as you can see, Math can get very subjective.
so at my school, an 80% is extremely respectable, only about top 5-10% get it!</p>