<p>I was admitted to all three (waitlisted at McGill and waiting on Queen's), and wanted personal opinions on a number of facets of life at these schools... maybe even including Queen's if you'd like. I'm an international transfer (rising sophomore/junior. Right in between because of credits)</p>
<p>-Social Life. I already have 5+ friends at each of these schools, and everyone's already trying to sell me his/her school haha. I want opinions from people I don't know.</p>
<p>-Academics: I guess Concordia lags behind the other two (three), but which one has a more reputable Economics program. Not in the business school. Also, which schools tends to have more grade inflation. I'm going to admit to wanting a high GPA.</p>
<p>-Which campus is more picturesque? More breathtaking, if you will.</p>
<p>-Which one places better into finance jobs in Toronto/New York/Chicago/L.A? Economics major. Again, Not in the business school.</p>
<p>Go to Western econ, apply for Ivey HBA status for years 3/4 once you’re there. If you seriously want “finance jobs in Toronto/New York/Chicago/L.A,” Ivey is your best bet.</p>
<p>Re:UBC; Beautiful campus in my opinion, but it’s a huge school with massive classes, supposedly harsh grading curves, and many commuters (weaker community?). I love Vancouver though.</p>
<p>Thank you, Stars. Ivey is definitely on my radar. Only problem is, Western transferred fewer courses than the others… much fewer. But it’s still in the running. Anyone willing to go into detail about each of the schools? I haven’t visited.</p>
<p>UBC is the most beautiful campus, by FAR, and also located in the best city. Its Vancouver campus is on the most amazing wooded peninsula with views of the mountains, ocean, and forest. As a school, it is considered #22 in the world or something, and has a very good reputation for anything in the sciences. </p>
<p>All I know about Western is that it has lost its reputation for being a very academic school in the past few decades. It is also regarded as a “party” school–big time.</p>
<p>Queens is also a BIG-time party school…and in Kingston, Ontario, which in my opinion is a pretty icky location :(</p>
<p>P.S. If i were you, this would be my choices from 1-4</p>
<ol>
<li><p>McGill/UBC (depends on where you want to live and what you are going into. Liberal Arts, McGill is stronger. UBC, sciences stronger.)</p></li>
<li><p>Queens/Western</p></li>
</ol>
<p>I only know UBC but everyone is right, the campus is GORGEOUS. Maybe the social aspect is a little weaker but you can always find people either on or off campus that share your interests. Vancouver is awesome, but expensive, so keep that in mind.</p>
<p>I’m not totally familiar with the Econ. department but from what I hear it’s pretty good. Maybe not the BEST, but pretty rigorous with some great (and some terrible faculty). I was in Poli Sci myself, and had pretty good experience.</p>
<p>UBC has the best economics department in Canada, though they are arguably tied with Toronto. Canada has only 4 internationally reputable economics departments and 3 or 4 more departments that are considered average by American standards. </p>
<p>If you are outside of these 4 schools it is considerably more difficult to get into very good graduate programs for economics/finance and you would generally do a masters at one of these schools. UBC in particularly has probably the best reputation among government institutions for doing economic policy (Bank of Canada and STATs canada recruit heavily from UBC), Toronto/Western/Queens usually have advantages on the CANADIAN private sector because of their proximity to Canada’s financial district. Outside of Canada, for finance U of T/UWO have more active recruiting from financial firms, UBC is better known in the Asia pacific. If you want to go into commercial banking an economics degree from any place is fine, for iBanking you pretty much are limited to Queens, U of T, UWO in Canada. </p>
<p>UBC, U of T (Top 25)
UWO, Queens (Top 50) </p>
<p>Mcmaster, SFU, Calgary, Mcgill, U Montreal have okay, but not great programs, generally ranking between 50-100. </p>
<p>You have probably made your decision. I wanted this archived for others.</p>
<p>UofT’s faculty trumps UBC’s. UBC’s faculty is not only subpar but considerably apathetic when it comes to their students. Just look at the placements.</p>
<p>EcceHomo: Job placements are not determined by the school you go to, although it should be considerably well-known. If a UBC student obtains good GPA and has an outstanding and active contribution to his college life, I don’t see why a job offer won’t possibly go to him instead of a UofT graduate. </p>
<p>The bottomline is, when it comes to job interviews, employers do assess candidates beyond grades and the reputation of his school.</p>
<p>I believe that those placements you were referring to are just statistics which are not a true reflection of the advantage of UofT grads in employment opportunities as opposed to their UBC counterparts.</p>
<p>I was talking about PhD graduates/Professors from top American schools being placed at a higher rate at UofT’s faculty than at UBC’s as well as PhD candidates from UofT placing at a higher rate in top American schools than their UBC counterparts. </p>
<p>Academic placements are a lot different than Industrial placements.</p>
<p>I did a brief internship with one of UBC’s professor emeritus and I jokingly asked the professor to compare faculty strength/research/placements of most Canadian economic departments and to name the best of each category…guess what? </p>
<p>The reply was overwhelmingly-UofT, UofT and UofT. Although the professor did mention that UBC DID have different areas of focus that were stronger but overall UofT, in the professor’s opinion, was the best. As well, as an educator who had given a great amount of time/effort into UBC, this admission could not have been easy so I am certain that UofT is the better school. </p>
<p>Most rankings demonstrate this fact, your response is based upon a fringe belief, not one echoed by most academics, nationally or abroad. Even UBC does not market such rankings, instead they offer a different ranking which caters specifically to PhD candidates, tsk tsk. Include rankings from AER, Ecta, JPE, QJE, ReStud and UBC doesn’t even break top 30. </p>
<p>I don’t know where this UBC homerism comes from, but it has to stop, especially when it comes to areas that UofT is actually strong in. SMH</p>