RunnerGrad

Just to provide an update:  I received my official (via post) offer to the University of Toronto's MPH in Community Nutrition today, just about 1 month after receiving the email offer (which was on March 6th).  Hopefully those of you waiting for the other specializations at UofT will hear back soon!

Only some of the MPH streams at UofT do interviews. Nutrition and Dietetics and OEH have interviews, Health Promotion does not, and I'm not sure about the other streams. I'm in Nutrition and Dietetics, if you have questions about UofT.

Canada rarely places PhD's as professors in US schools? Really?

Firstly, there's only 3 Canadian schools that are top 100, with McMaster close but currently out.

Speaking from personal anecdote though, the president of my undergrad uni (in the states) got both his MSc and PhD from the U of T. My undergrad departments (2) have a combined 15 faculty members out of ~50 that have at least one of their graduate degrees from a top Canadian school.

The University of Waterloo is one of the biggest draws for top computer scientists and engineers in the world. Toronto is the 3rd biggest place in North America for startups, and the University of toronto was recently ranked #1 for startups in North America. You're 1. Talking out of your ass and 2. Being naive about an entire country if you're stating Canada doesn't produce top PhDs.

Also, the 2015 times higher education reputation rankings just came out. These rankings are just based on perceived reputation, not research funding or this or that.

University of toronto was #16, higher than UPenn, Johns Hopkins, Cornell, NYU, Brown, Carnegie mellon, and so many others.

I wanted to add that McGill is competitively ranked in world university rankings with the other schools you mentioned.  University of Illinois is ranked 29th in the world, McGill is ranked 39th, and Penn State is ranked 58th.  So as you can see it is not much lower than University of Illinois and is quite a bit higher than Penn State.
 
Also, for the person who is trying to claim Canadian universities can't compete with US universities - not only is McGill ranked 39th in the world, ranking higher than MANY US universities, University of Toronto is ranked 20th and University of British Columbia is ranked 32nd .  To put that into perspective - University of Toronto is ranked higher than Northwestern, Carnegie Mellon, NYU and other schools that are typically seen as very good US schools. 

Personally only applied to UK and Canadian schools, I'm an American coming from an American undergrad. I'll be attending the U of T, and also got accepted to University College London.

I had the option to apply and likely get accepted to similar programs at Yale, Michigan, Duke, and Columbia. I didn't even apply cuz the Canadian and UK programs were frankly better, and the prestige was high.

U of T and McGill are the Harvard/Yale or Oxford/Cambridge of Canada. Both are excellent and have awesome reputations. Whenever I wear my U of T sweatshirt in my undergrad facilities, I always get comments from faculty and students like "whoa did you go there??" it's a very cool experience.

Good luck at McGill!

Users that personally attack others (mocking usernames etc.) are issued warnings and monitored.
 
Everyone is free to state your opinions on the quality of Canada and Canadian schools, but do it in a way that respect other users. Respectful opinions lead to useful discussion and I think it is a good thing that these thoughts are being discussed and uninformed opinions are corrected.
 
To respond to the latest question:
 
 
No, Bernard is not right. During the recession in 2009, the Canadian banks and real estate markets stayed stable while US housing and banks needed to be bailed out. I would say that the Canadian economy is indeed reliant on the US economy because the US and China are our biggest trading partners. The US economy is obviously bigger than Canada -- the US population is 10 times the size of Canada. However, both economies are healthy and strong and at the level you'd care about for graduate school, both economies will serve you fine.
 
The UofT strike has nothing to do with the Canadian economy. I'm a little surprised (but happy) that there is so much worldwide coverage on this actually. Employees (including graduate students) at Universities are unionized in Canada (many more unions in Canada than the US). Usually, the process works well and there is a little tension when negotiations happen but things will work out. Going to an actual strike is less common but it happens at a school in Canada every few years (sometimes it's the students, sometimes it's the professors, sometimes it's the maintenance staff etc.) I would say this is all part of the normal labour bargaining process, not a sign that the economy is failing. 
 
Some might say that strikes are a sign of the system failing and while it is true that a strike (or lockout) is a failure to bargain fairly, I would rather have strikes than the inability to bargain and being forced to accept poor working conditions.
 
As for job opportunities, it depends on what your field is and what your goals are. If your goal is a job in the US then yes, going to a US school will definitely help you because you can make more US connections (staying in country = no visa issues). But if you are just trying to find work anywhere, a McGill PhD will serve you just as well as similar ranked schools in the US (ranked 20-30). For what it's worth, at my top US program, we regularly accept Canadian students and postdocs and they tend to all come from the big 3 Canadian schools (McGill, Toronto, UBC). McGill is one of the big names in the US -- when I tell people I'm Canadian, they try to guess which school I'm from and their first guess is usually McGill.

Gonna reply a little tongue-in-cheek. Here's a joke course description I composed for all my fellow Drake fan friends and Torontonians.

OVO424: Special Topics in Drizzy Studies: The 6ix.

This seminar course explores Drake in relation to his city and its culture. Students have an option between an intensive research paper and an event proposal for a Drake concert (service learning). Possible topics include: Drake and Degrassi, Aubreyotics, Young Money Macroeconomics, the cultural politics of the 6ix, ethical representations of Scarborough in pop culture, Comparative Forest Hills (with a special focus on J Cole), and translocal studies of Toronto and Memphis.

Bernard1992 - Please tell me you are joking.  Please.  Because I don't want to believe that someone who is at a graduate level education is so COMPLETELY uneducated about Canada.
 
arsham-rezaeyeh - Please do not listen to anything this person says!  McGill is a great school and Canada is an amazing country with lots of opportunities.

I do agree that we should stop contacting Angela if it is only regarding admission related questions. However, I do not think people are "freaking out" so much as they are feeling anxious and eager - myself included Please remember you were also once in the same position as us and people handle this kind of stress very differently especially if they have other circumstances not related to the situation to deal with. Let's continue to keep this a supportive space!

Yes! Timmies has infiltrated the south

A university in Canada is equivalent to college in USA and a college in Canada is equivalent to a community college in USA. In terms of Clinical or counselling specifically, if you want to become a licensed counselling psychologist or a clinical psychologist, I would go to a 4 year university and build up your research experience in labs on that campus, do a thesis, go to conferences, get some publications etc. then apply to a MA or PhD program. That's really your best bet to get into a counselling or clinical program in Canada, they are very competitive so starting off in university right away is probably your best option. On the other hand, if you want to work as a counsellor like in mental health or in education you could take a few courses in college then transfer over to university and not focus as much on the research aspect, but at the end of the day all graduate schools here require a bachelors in some form as a minimum admissions requirement so it probably would serve you best to start off in university either way.

I have two older girls that were small when I did my BA and had my son in the middle of my MA which was also the first month of my RA.  I was stressed to death about having a baby right at the beginning of an NSF research position.  It was fine.  I had a great supervisor and PI, and that was key.  In some ways being a parent to a young one helped me by FORCING me to extremely organized with my time.  

Here are some of my thoughts (some of it is repeated from above and not necessarily in order of importance.
 
1. Baby wearing!  Find the one you love and use it.
2. Find the perfect mix of parent time and student time.  If you can mix the two, great.  If you can't, don't (which is also great).  Just be honest with yourself about what works and be open to the idea that this is a fluid relationship that WILL CHANGE.  What worked last week won't work this week, that's fine.  Just keep options open for when you have to have student only time, which can be difficult.
3. Get a support network together now!  Look into what childcare you need to have, I have always used an on campus daycare.  It has been the best decision I could have made.  The baby was close when I needed to nurse him, and it was less expensive than any other option.  Find a parent group and work out friends you can call in emergency type situations where you just need a few hours to finish a paper or whatever. 
4.  If you can find an advisor who is kid friendly, do it.  I can't stress this enough.  You will have more to do than you can imagine and you REALLY don't need to be fighting your advisor in the meantime.  I have seen students with babies and unsupportive advisors, and it isn't pretty.
5.  Trust yourself.  You will hear an amazing amount of advice.  In the end, do what works for you and your little family, whatever that is.  For us, we co-slept (got great sleep!) and demand fed and almost NEVER did laundry.  It worked for us.  Some of my friends lost their minds doing what worked for me, and I lost mine trying to sleep train.  Bottom line: do what you need to do to get through.  First year is the hardest (both baby and grad school).  You can do it!
 
And lastly, and probably most importantly...Grad school is HARD on relationships.  Babies can be HARD on relationships.  Be open with your partner now about your feelings, goals, needs, EVERYTHING.  Talk about how you want to manage baby care and grad school responsibilites now, before the baby comes.  Grad school is very demanding and a fairly selfish endevour (even for the most selfless person).  A baby will intensify this.  Be good to each other.  Don't let things eat at you, and don't your partner do the same.  ENJOY this time.  As crazy as it is...it is amazing!!  Best of Luck to you all!

This is why I'm excited for grad school. I love reading, writing, grading, and studying. For me, school is fun, while going to parties is extremely boring. You have only reaffirmed my commitment to go to grad school!

Uh, no. The comment was inappropriate and misogynistic. Joke or not, this is not a place for these kind of comments. And this is coming from a guy...

^ Hah. Lots of people taking this comment way too seriously. 
 
No matter how objective you try to be in situations like this, people will try to play it off like you're favoriting the student if it becomes apparent you two are involved. Depending on your school's policies, this could very plausibly lead to a huge mess and set you back in some way. But that's already been said. I'd tell her that you need to stop things (whatever those 'things' may be, no matter how minimally intimate or flirty they are) immediately until the semester is over. 

What school is your supervisor going to? Canada is actually great for digital humanities, there is a thread on here from this year where there are likeminded students talking about it. This is ultimately a very complex decision and I wish you all the best!

My point was that some of us were accepted to both professional masters and research-based masters programs. So telling us that we don't know what we're doing when it comes to applying to research-based programs is inaccurate. Also saying that universities want to admit as many professional masters students as possible to make money off of us is also inaccurate. I know that one of the professional masters programs at my undergraduate university loses money each year, as tuition doesn't even begin to cover the costs of running the program. It is actually online undergraduate courses that help fund some of the graduate programs, including the professional programs.

Also, after completing my professional masters degree, I will be eligible to apply to PhD programs in Canada, just as if I had done a research-based masters, because my professional programs includes elective research courses and practica, which I plan on taking to keep my options open.

Now, things in the US may be different (I still can't believe you can go straight from undergrad to PhD programs without doing a Masters first) but you can't say all professional masters admit tons of students just to make money off of them. That is simply not the case.

The MPH program that I've gained admission to only accepts 10 students per year, and is incredibly competitive. While not fully funded, I will receive financial assistance through scholarships and TAships. So I don't think you can generalize about professional programs. Why is our cohort so small? Well, it includes an accredited dietetic internship, and they can only provide the required types of internship and practicum placements for that many students.
I was also accepted to a fully funded MSc program. You just don't go from undergrad to PhD in my field in Canada. You need an masters degree to be able to apply to a PhD program.

7 replies and nobody has bothered to ask for the relevant data in this situation?  
 
Pictures, man. We need to see pictures of this girl before we advise on the correct course of action.

Generally, I work under the assumption that whenever I'm being asked to waive a right that it's not a good thing. I did for my application season as it does me no good to fight it. But, it just strikes me as skeevy that in order to obtain higher education you functionally have to discard a right provided to you by law.

Haha. Interesting. I don't see why anyone wouldn't want to see their recommendations. I certainly don't see why a boss, professor, etc. would look poorly on or be offended by someone asking to see their letters. You, the applicant, have a lot at stake in getting good letters. I'm not even so much concerned about a letter writer saying bad things in their letter. Your advisor, professor, or whoever probably had many recommendation letters to write, and its entirely possible that the letter left out important things that you have done or was hastily written. Why jeopardize your application with such a stupid, avoidable thing?

Asking a recommender for a copy of their letter is somewhat in bad taste and might even greatly offend your writer. It definitely sends the message that you do not trust them to write a good letter. If I were a professor and my student asked to see a letter before I submitted it, I would tell them to look elsewhere for a LOR. If you aren't certain that someone will writer a strong letter for you, then you shouldn't ask them to. But of course that is just my opinion.
 
I agree with the general consensus that you should try to get into a research-based masters program, funded or otherwise. High grades in graduate courses will help offset your low uGPA (although to be honest, this still might haunt you even after getting a masters degree), and doing a thesis (as well as publishing your results) will help show the adcomm that you have the capability to be a productive scientist and successful student.
 
I second the idea of looking at state schools for neuroscience or biology programs. They aren't always funded, but they are inexpensive if you do have to pay.
 
 
 

I disagree. 

Yes. You should absolutely ask your recommenders for a copy of their letters. Ideally, you should have done that before they were submitted. I've never asked for a recommendation from someone that wouldn't let me read what they wrote about me.