Making my decision

College Search & Selection
1

So, I’ve gotten all my acceptances and now I’m deciding on where to go. I know it’s kind of early, but at some places the early bird gets the worm for housing and I’d like to get the jump on it if I can.

I only applied to places I really liked and could realistically see myself at, got in to all of them, and I’m just quite torn. I want to major in foreign relations, maybe with a minor in environmental science. Maybe someone else can see something I don’t?

UMBC (safety) –
Pros: Close to home, Honors College, would cost next to nothing with merit aid.
Cons: Too close to home, reputation as a boring suburban/commuter school, too STEM-focused?

Pitt (loose second choice) –
Pros: Offers great foreign relations program, I like Pittsburgh.
Cons: Didn’t get any aid, so a little expensive.

Wisconsin-Madison –
Pros: Traditional state flagship feel, I like Madison.
Cons: Far away, expensive.

McGill (loose top choice) –
Pros: Strong international reputation, I really like Montreal, get to avoid toxic U.S. politics, incredibly affordable.
Cons: Maybe a little far away, no French language skills for survival off-campus, not into activist culture?

UVM –
Pros: Good for environmental science, I like Burlington, affordable with merit aid.
Cons: Too small-towny? Too stoner-y/hipster-y?

Rutgers –
Pros: Honors College, affordable with merit aid.
Cons: Only visited briefly, don’t know a lot about it.

Thanks for your time!

2

for me… so just my opinion…the only school on that list I would go to is pitt.

great city, great school, surrounded by a lot of other schools.(lots of young folks) the area has a lot going on for it. pittsburgh is a city that was on life support facing demise, and came back as a super awesome, revitalized vibrant cutting edge city. it truly is a miracle. anyway, pitt is a great all around university and you should easily find your niche there as well as learn a lot. .

3

I’d add McGill. Montreal is a wonderful city for a college student. Most everyone speaks some english (except in the rural areas) , and you’d pick up French fairly quickly living there.

4

I am going to second McGill. Probably the most culturally interesting option on your list, well regarded, no need to know French. Just an exciting place to go to school.

5

There are 400,000 Anglophone (English mother tongue) residents of Montreal you would have few if any problems off campus.

6

Another McGill fan here, but will the environmental science classes be at the MacDonald campus? Would you be okay with the shuttling back and forth?

7

You won’t get to avoid US politics in Canada. It’s all over the news. US politics is always all over the news in Canada. What activist culture?

8

I had non-french-speaking friends go to McGill and the loved it. One actually got some kind of environmental degree there. Are you going to have to take out loans for any of these?

9

Looks like you have some solid choices and I don’t think you could go wrong with any of them! As you wrote, they all have their pros and cons - so it probably comes down to what you think is realistically affordable and then your gut! have you had a chance to visit all?

10

I agree that McGill strikes me as the best bet here, although I have heard more than one student complain about the enormous class sizes at the popular Canadian universities, including McGill:

http://montrealgazette.com/news/national/opinion-enormous-university-class-sizes-leave-students-feeling-like-numbers

11

I think most people in Montreal speak English, so no worries.
Burlington is a great sized college town. Not too small.
Rutgers is in a blah area. Nothing special there.

12

@Scipio
From that article:

“Things aren’t much better at McGill University, where Marcus Kolber, a recent graduate, says his course on introduction to molecular biology had nearly 1,000 students.”

I may be splitting hairs here, but I thought the largest lecture hall at McGill, Leacock 132, seated 600-some students. Am I mistaken? Not that there’s THAT much difference between a lecture with 600 students and 1000 students. Surely they don’t overenroll, assuming a large number of students won’t show up for the lecture?

What the article doesn’t mention is that most (all?) of these lectures also have a weekly tutorial/lab with ~30 students.

13

McGill sounds nice to me, too! I hear it’s a great school. Pitt 2nd choice.

When you say “surprisingly affordable”, do you mean without FA?

Can Americans get FA there?

Good luck in deciding.

14

internationals can receive both merit and need based aid at McGill. However you should not expect the aid to approach full tuition.

Yes, first year lectures in Arts and Sciences are large but not really any different from large American publics: UC Berkeley, Michigan, UCLA etc.

15

@Scipio The first paragraph in that article has at least one outright fabrication in it. There is no lecture hall directly above a subway station at U of T.

The rest of the person’s complaints are exaggerations. There is one lecture hall on U of T’s campus that seats about 1300 students. There are a small number of first year courses that are scheduled there. I took first year biology and chemistry at U of T and never had a class in that hall. The other “large” lecture halls seat about 150-300. All professors are required to have office hours and give out their email. S14 has never had a problem contacting a prof.

16

Thanks for all the insight you all have given.

@ShrimpBurrito I’d be doing Arts at the downtown campus if I went to McGill.

@bouders Maybe it’s just a vocal minority, but I got the impression McGill (specifically, the student union there) is known for being excessively political.

@TomSrOfBoston But not knowing any French kind of limits what you can do off-campus, no? Certainly you can’t get a job. At least I know Spanish.

@sunnyschool No, I can afford McGill out-of-pocket. Tuition and room/board isn’t much higher than my in-state safety (UMBC) if I hadn’t gotten merit aid there. The exchange rate is a real boon.

@Fishnlines29 Yes, I’ve visited (to different extents) all of them, and my problem is that nothing at any of them really struck me. I guess I’m just going to have to decide on gut feel, as you put it.

17

Employment off campus without French is limited but not impossible.

18

If u speak Spanish well, u could tutor it.

19

Exchange rate is a good consideration. It changes all the time. If it’s favorable now, within a 4 year span it could easily flip the other way. Would McGill still be affordable? I live near the Canadian border and see first hand the financial impacts of the changing exchange rate.

Also, crossing the border adds extra time & hassle to every trip home.

I am generally in favor of breaking out of one’s comfort zone when going off to college, just be sure you know what you’re getting into.

Can you even get an off campus job in Canada while there as a student?

20

“@ShrimpBurrito I’d be doing Arts at the downtown campus if I went to McGill.”

Yes, but aren’t the Environmental Science classes at the MacDonald campus? If you minor in ES, you’ll likely have to do some traveling between the two campuses. That’s not necessarily a bad thing; the Mac campus is beautiful and a nice change of pace from downtown, but it is about a 45 minute shuttle ride each way, and scheduling your classes may be trickier.

For the record, I’ve been traveling between the US and Canada by air a lot recently, and the fact that it’s international has added an average of ~20 minutes each trip. Maybe I’ve just been lucky. I do have to carry a passport and fill out the customs forms, but they have the system pretty streamlined at the major airports. (Or at least they did before the new administration took office. Hopefully that won’t change.) Flights to/from Canada do tend to be more expensive, however, at least from my home city.

Good luck with whatever you decide.