Neontrotsky

I'm currently a Junior in college considering graduate education in Political Science(specifically theory and/or comparative). I recently toured the University of Victoria, mainly because I was there and had a free afternoon. I'm curious about the quality of Canadian schools in general(Are Canadian degrees taken seriously in the U.S?-no offense intended Canada ), and if it's worth even considering. It seems like they may be a bit more generous with funding/assistantships (even giving them to master's students, which seems to be almost unheard of in the U.S) Is there anything weird about the way Canadian schools work that I should keep in mind? (For example, U. Vic. seemed tor require a masters in order to be accepted into the PhD program, is this standard?)