<p>Any Canadians applying to colleges this year, or who have applied in the past, post you stats. :)</p>
<p>Hi guys,
I am an international student from Malaysia. I'm interested to attend Bronte College of Canada at Missisauga,Ontario to do the OSSD as well as the AP. Do you think it is a good choice if I want to apply to the top tier unis in UK as well as the Ivy Leagues in the US after completing the OSSD? A lot of my seniors told me to do the A-level or IB as they are more internationally recognised compared to the OSSD. What do you guys think? Hope to hear from you soon.</p>
<p>I've never heard of that school. I don't understand what you want to do. Are you coming over to do highschool in Canada? Are you going private? day or boarding? I'm not familiar with any schools that offer A-levels (I'm not saying they don't exist, only if they do, I'm not familiar with them) but I would choose IB over AP any day.Also, I have no idea what the OSSD is but maybe it's an ontario thing?</p>
<p>Oh and do answer the op's question, I am cdn and will be applying to some colleges this year as a transfer student from Queen's. i'm looking at some small LAC's and also maybe Western. Stats are pretty straightforward. Lots of EC's in school, 4.0 in hs, 30 on ACT, uni is not as a good!</p>
<p>I was born in Ottawa, but I moved to the US when I was four. I still go up there every summer to visit my dad and grandmother.</p>
<p>How is Queen's "not as good?"
now that's real discouraging news, esp from a queen's student. I just submitted my queen's online app yesterday!</p>
<p>HEY awesomeming, my friend went to Bronte college, he is at Waterloo now. He told me that Bronte college was a horrible place. NO INTERNET!!! (there is internet, but internet is not good enough even for MSN).
and there is almost NOTHING to do around the school. The cafe food is like vomit and the whole environment was horrible!</p>
<p>megtf, what's wrong with Queen's?
may i ask what kind of GPA you have at Queen's?
i am transfering from Utoronto with 3.5ish.</p>
<p>Yeah, is there something vilely sinister about Queen's?</p>
<p>Bronte is only for foreigners,I think.who have poor grades and want to come to canada as a last resort.
Better apply to Upper Canada College for boys,
Havergal,bishop Strachans for girls etc these are the leaders in private education.The fee at Bronte will be similar to these top notch high schools.But you must have good grades to get in,not Malaysian reject grades lol</p>
<p>hahaha sorry! Not trying to discourage people against Queen's! It's just not the right place for me. My first year I studied abroad at the ISC (aka the castle) and it was great. A really small environment. But at the main campus, I was just not happy. I didn't really feel challenged academically, the buildings are really beautiful on the outside but only so-so on the inside and I found it really hard to connect to my prof's and TA's in my major (though the language prof's are really accesible). Plus one of my main problems was a lack of diversity. I don't want to be surrounded by a lot of students who think Ontario is the be all and end all of the world and that is sort of how I felt there. Definately not everyone will have this experience but it's just how I felt. Plus I'm interested in american political science and want more of a focus on that.</p>
<p>That's probably what you should expect from Queens. It's has a reputation in Toronto for being a bit of an old money school. Rich people from Ontario (read: Toronto and surrounding suburbs) tend to have this idea that Ontario is the end all be all of Canada, which is probably why the rest of Canada hates us. Spend some time in working class areas of Toronto and you'll find that the majority of us really have other things to worry about than calling our city the centre of the universe.</p>
<p>Thats great to hear ICrisis. I'm not anti establishment or anti money or anything (in fact my mother just moved to Ontario. Thankfully she is on the edge so I can escape to the states at my leisure) but that is exactly the attitude I detest (Toronto is the end of the world).</p>
<p>To be honest, I brush off anti-Toronto statements as mostly jealously or ignorance myself. If you're from Calgary, Vancouver, Montreal, Edmonton, Ottawa, St. John's, Halifax or wherever and you hate Toronto, you know what I think of your city? I don't.</p>
<p>"To be honest, I brush off anti-Toronto statements as mostly jealously or ignorance myself. If you're from Calgary, Vancouver, Montreal, Edmonton, Ottawa, St. John's, Halifax or wherever and you hate Toronto, you know what I think of your city? I don't."</p>
<p>LOL. So true. One thing I like about Toronto is that people there don't define their city or themselves by putting down the inhabitants of a more prominent city such as Chicago or New York. It's pretty funny how while some people with time on their hands in other cities in Canada (often in places in Quebec or Alberta) think they have some sort of intense "rivalry" with Toronto, people in Toronto don't even notice that one ever existed. They just go about their lives and generally find far more interesting things to discuss than that. I've never heard any person from Toronto say how much they loathe people from Montreal or Vancouver or <insert canadian="" city="" here="">. In fact the ones that I've met have very positive opinions of those cities, and most other places in Canada too. </insert></p>
<p>Why the negativity in return? Jealousy and ignorance... icrisis is probably right.</p>
<p>where is the negativity? i don't see any...
Toronto is cool, TOO COOOL and windy....</p>
<p>
[quote]
I brush off anti-Toronto statements as mostly jealously or ignorance myself.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>You know, many people who don't like Toronto have actually been there. Some have lived there for a time. In those cases, the dislike (not hate) of the city is due to non-trivial reasons. In a number of cases it's because (at least to them), it's a huge impersonal city (and it has been growing bigger over the past few years), and because of its perceived lack of personality. </p>
<p>Now there's also the perception that those who live there don't know and don't care about anything happening outside its borders (which is partially true, as it's always true of some people anywhere, it can be especially true of wealthy places). In terms of economics and politics, any densely populated region will hold a lot of power by sheer force of numbers. This inevitably leads to the feeling of alienation amongst less densely populated area with less voice politically and economically, as their interests are in many ways underrepresented in the higher levels of government and economic centers. For example, you see similar resentment between the rest of Quebec vs Montreal, and though there are a number of misconceptions that are prevalent, it is not all unjustified. Of course Toronto's not all bad either (just soulless ;)).</p>
<p>I can dig that. In fact, I live in Montreal currently (full time, I have a job and I go to school so I can proudly say that) so I'm getting the feel of what it's like here. Working on the French too of course.</p>
<ol>
<li><p>Toronto is a huge city, geographically and population wise. However, I'd submit that the people who usually say they are from Toronto are actually from one of the "exurbs" (Mississauga, Brampton, Scarborough, Vaughn,Richmond Hill etc.) that were amalgamated into the city in the late 90's. I don't even consider those places to actually be Toronto (in Mississauga's case, it isn't). These places actually are souless and lack culture. This is probably why a lot of us feel like we're the centre of the universe because the surrounding areas blow chucks. The two nearest REAL cities are Hamilton (smells like sulfur all the time) and Buffalo (economically stagnant with a declinging population). Montreal is fairly close to New York City (one of the greats), Ottawa is humbled by being close Montreal, Vancouver has Seattle, Edmonton and Calgary have each other. Toronto? We literally have nothing even comparable to rival within a five hour drive. That being said, when compared to cities of similiar size we stand up pretty well. Plus, most mulicultural city in the world, may not mean much to most people, but to minorities like myself and Canada which promotes it as an official policy, this is something to be admired by everyone, in my opinion.</p></li>
<li><p>Big cities can be impersonal. I found Montreal impersonal when I first got here too. I found that people were were too artsy and style concious city, too much government inefficiency, badly paved streets, confusing tax structure, confusing as hell property tax structure, found it embarassing that I was a unilingual anglophone (especially around the local females), extremely dirty downtown streets especially from Thursday nights to Sunday afternoons. But I grew to love it eventually. Granted, I still feel like a fish out of water in the Plateau, but I like the 3AM last call, amazing nightlife (and women), architechure is nice, like the compactness of the city, transit system is cheap and relatively efficient and I don't feel like such an ass anymore for not speaking French. I still hate the government stranglehold on this city though, especially with regards to private property (and I'm not just talking about language laws either). There are little enclaves I like to go to when I feel stressed in Montreal just like there are in Toronto. If you lived in Toronto or any city of more than a million for more than a year and you couldn't find these little corners, you aren't looking hard enough. </p></li>
<li><p>Finally, the reason I brush off a lot anti-Toronto sentiment is they are usually are just based on ignorance. Polluted? Yeah, we have bad air quality, a large portion of it comes from the Ohio Valley (along with the water pollution). We don't have the luxury that Vancouver has where their air pollution goes to the Fraser Valley. Cultureless? That's insane. Kensington Market, the six Chinatowns, Leaside, York U's largely Francophone Glendon campus, Little Italy, Corsica Italia, Little Portugal, Greektown, Little India, an emerging Little Iran, Little Korea, Jamestown ("little Jamaica") , Ronces, the Junction etc. There is a lot of anti-Toronto sentiment that I understand, the concentration of power, the fact that Canadian public policy for decades has always been cowtowing to elite Toronto businessmen, the National Energy Plan or how we had a chance to promote East-West trade during the early years of Confederation and instead chose to go more towards North-South trade creating an early dependence on the Americans. But until I hear someone say something like that, I don't feel the need to seriously respond.</p></li>
</ol>
<p>ah blobof you totally said what I wasn't articulating. When people put anti-Toronto senitments down to 'jealousy' or 'ignorance' they are only perpetuating peoples dislike and perceptions (however incorrect) that Torontonians just don't care about the rest of Canada. If it was just about being a big souless city, people would hold this view of Vancouver or Montreal as well, but it is always geared towards Toronto. That may be a bit unfair, but I think it is a combination of government dominance and a view of the attitude of the people that creates this.</p>
<p>I have consistantly heard torontonians compare Toronto to New York which is laughable since they are so different (and New York is better, in my opinion). For people to say 'I don't think about these other cities' really just increases alienation. No Canadian should be living in a bubble of their own city.</p>
<p>eta: Sorry I feel like a bit of a troll running around the intl. talking about western Canada and I don't mean it to come across that way. It's just typical of someone who feels underrepresented but the sort of perceived attitude is one thing I had a problem with at Queen's. But I've also been living abroad now for 3 years so I'm sure some of these things get blown out of proportion in my mind. Sorry!</p>
<p>I am a Korean citizen, but I study in Canada (Alberta) and will be applying to US this year. =) So i guess you can consider me half-Canadian XD</p>
<p>Umm ICrisis, except for Scarborough, none of the cities you mentioned are part of the amalgamated city of Toronto. It always makes me laugh when people say they're from Toronto and I ask which part and they say Thornhill, Markham, Oshawa, Richmond Hill, Vaughn etc. And Brampton?! LOL!</p>
<p>They are part of the Greater Toronto Area, but then again so are a lot of farms...</p>
<p>I am from toronto! i live at Bay and Bloor (that's toronto right? ;))</p>
<p>or is that amalgated in to toronto after the 1400s??</p>