Ahh. I am sad to admit that I know bad writing only too well. The times that I've read classmates' and friends' essays, I was just like . Often they just have the simplest sentence structure ever. Basically something liek '[This character] has done [action] because [reason], which lead to the development of [characteristic].' There is little flair and originality. my goal is, to write in a way that the prof would want to keep reading even if they didn't have to. Although I really have to work on this. other time, the essays are SO CONFUSING and the sentences are just all over the place, and you have no idea what they're trying to argue or even say.

From my understanding, when you get into New Rez, you have a certain amount of mney set aside for your meal plan. And you can have as many meals as you want each week. So when you go to the caf, you pick out your meal, say a hamburger, fries, Coke and an apple. you then go check-out or whatever they have, and they charge you for each item. They give you a total and take that balance off your card. So your meal cost depends on how much you eat. It sucks because with a a set number of meals meal plan - like you have 20 meals per week, and so when you go to the caf, you give your card to the lady before going into the actual caf and she scans your card and you go in and eat. You can eat as much as you can and you still pay for only one meal, and people use this as an opportunity to take snacks with them or stay in the caf and stdfy and eat while only paying one-meal worth of money.

See, yeah, 9 bucks for dinner may seem reasonable....when you go out. I have no problem going out for a meal once in a while and spending 20-30 bucks. but I can't in good conscience spend 9 dollars for dinner every day. by my calculations (assuming breakfast and lunch as about half the price of dinner), you'll end spending somewhere around 3000 on food alone.

by the way: yay!! you officially accepted?

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McGill Arts '12

Yeah, I am officially accepted. I have been for almost a month now. It was really frustrating. First I got an email saying "you're status has changed on Minerva." Then I tried to log into Minerva, but I forgot my password, since I couldn't use the password I normally use because they have all those rules on Minerva. I tried the wrong password too many times so my account got deactivated, and then I emailed McGill to fix it, but they just said "you have to call." So then I had to call McGill, and they fixed my account. Then it said on Minverva Accepted pending final results or whatever, but wait for official results. A couple days later I got 4 emails from McGill, one saying that I got accepted to each of Arts, Arts&Science, Science and Engineering (all unofficial). Finally, two weeks later I got my package. However, I still don't know what average I have to keep by the end of the year, which kind of sucks, because my grades are plummeting (spending too much time on studentawards, perhaps?). Actually, I spend way too much time thinking about how awesome next year is going to be, instead of enjoying my last year of high school.

Actually, next week is my 18th birthday. I want to take a trip down to Montreal to celebrate/ visit McGill again, but we'll see whether I can convince my parents that that would be a good idea. I could enjoy a very brief period of being legal!

The New Rez declining balance meal plan sounds like a good idea. The only thing is, I have a friend at UBC, and that's the kind of meal plan that she has and she ran out of food in like february and had to get a job so she could put more money on her meal plan and eat. And, its not like she eats a whole lot either. On the other hand, it would be hard to gain the freshman 15 if you can afford to eat ;) (jk)



This is too funny. The people I know basically, if we are critiquing an article or something, they paraphrase the article and I'm like no, you actually have to add your own opinions to that to make it worth reading, otherwise it's just the same as the article.

Window into my head right now: MCGILL MCGILL MCGILL MCGILL MCGILL MCGILL MCGILL MCGILL

I don't understand how people can be not thinking about McGill right now
lol. I think that I will watch the utours video about McGill again

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University of Toronto: Engineering Science 1T2

I know. I just want to go already! How dare they make us wait for 2 months of school and then 2 months of summer? Well, actually I can't for summer because I'm going to have the best summer ever, but I kind wish that McGill would send us all letters saying that for all attendees, the last 2 months of summer are cancelled along with exams, which they made possible by sheer power of their awesomeness and we all have to head down their for a 4-month long Frosh Week.

About the grades, I think if you drop 3-5%, it doesn't matter. Because my average is also steadily declining. I have an exam this thursday, and I haven't started studying, ugh, plus a whole bunch of other crap. I'm kind of torn between wanting to finish grade 12 with an 90+ average and also not wanting to put in any effort whatsoever into school work.

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McGill Arts '12

This is my philosophy: "I'm good at math, so I don't have to go to class/do any homework/study ever"
As it turns out, my lowest marks this year are adv functions and calc.
And I am going in to math...
This year, I am getting mid/high nineties in social science type courses, and not doing as well in math, but I really don't whether its because I am a closest artsy person or because I do no work in science or math courses and decent work in artsy courses.

You are lucky that you have a Politics course at your school. I don't
My list of courses makes me want to cry a little too, but I guess that you have to do a little bit of grunt work to get where you want to be. I know that I hate science, but love CS and Math, so I have very few options. I can't believe that I was going to go into engineering. What's wrong with me? I would definitely hate it, I just was intrigued by the design aspect.

You will recognize me when you see me in intro to poli sci ;)
trust me...
lol. I just realiozed that my aud at school holds about 250 ppl. First year science courses have 500+ people. Oh, lordy..

Also, I don't know if I mentioned this before, but do you feel like you got jibbed for scholarships to McGill? It's the only uni that gave me no scholarship money. Curse my 94.5ish av! not close enough to 95 for McGill apparently.

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University of Toronto: Engineering Science 1T2

You both have amazing averages. shh.
My arts top 6 is 91.3
My science top 6 is 89.5 which is what counts =(
And I guess McGill knows that it will attract top students without any monetary awards.
Like I will still go probably even if they dont' give me a cent. Lol.

I wish I took more artsy, social sciency courses in high school, like politics, law, economics... I haven't taken a single business course and am financially illiterate. I wanted to keep my options for med school open and took all the sciences >_> Dumb.

My gr 12 courses: Calc, Data, Bio, Chem, Physics, French, Philosophy this year + English, World Issues, RCM Piano, Lol.

I'm going to join you in the front row heythereb.
I'm prepared for like a 30% drop in my marks attending school with a bunch of smart people. I will be ecstatic to just survive first year.
About essays, I'm sure creativity will be welcomed. As long as you are capable of it - and I'm sure you will be.

I have an english teacher at my school who reads only the first essay that the students write - and then base all of their marks on the first essay. Not reading another word from their work the whole semester.. Lol. So if your first essay is a 95, that is what you end up with. Ditto for the 70s. Duuumb. Luckily I never had him.

Most of my teachers were cool with me not following that dumb 5 paragraph format essay. I think I had it sorta lucky. My philosophy teacher especially encouraged us to get out of that mode and write however we wanted to <3


And I'm actually looking forward to the lecture hall classrooms. Call me weird but I'm really into doing things differently - it'd be like watching a presentation every day... I'm sick of overhead notes. Lol. It'll just be a tad bit more awkward to ask questions I think.

About the courses, how do you know if we can take them first year or not? I thought the numbers were according to year but I'm starting to doubt it?
I will also be taking Microeconomic Analysis and Applications

I'm pretty overwhelmed with the different codes for Maths and Sciences... I have to try and cover the prereqs. Bahh.

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Juiced8 - I don't think anyone said that McGill class sizes go up to 1000. I said that if you compare first year at McGill vs U of T, you might get class sizes up to 1000 at the latter.

tmhlee - I know what you mean about the arts courses. I did the biggest faux-pas possible in grade 12. I started the year with 7 courses, and then dropped Econ like a week into school because I was like "Well, it's not a science and I don't want to waste my energy on it." How wrong I was. Thankfully I could drop Chem, which was the biggest nightmare ever. Not that I'm saying I would have 95+% if I were taking all Arts courses but at least exams wouldn't be such a horror. I'm not sure how I'll do the Calc and Bio exam, especially since it's rumored that it's in the same week (I hope they are though, because I was the second week off). And most of the idea that I'll be de-accepted if my mark droped 3-5% if gone, but I don't want to get too confident. Plus, POlitics - you are REALLY not missing anything this year, if your course material is the same as mine. We just cover the basics, like UN, international law, and different types of political ideology. I'm sure you'd cover the entire year's info in half the semester in Intro to PoliSci. And law at my school is taught by this teacher with the biggest stick up his bum- it's like having a corpse teach you, he is that lifeless.

Yay, so I have 2 courses in common with you guys.



See I don't even know if I'm capable of creativity after 4 years being told to follow one format of writing. I found my Romeo and Juliet essay from grade 9 a couple months ago. I argued that it was a good thing that Juliet died because if they had stayed together, Romeo would have ended up cheating on her because of what his past actions revealed about his character. So I was reading it and started cracking up, because it was hilarious that this was what my 14-year-old self thought up of. It wasn't in essay format, of course, and more of a humor piece than anything. My teacher wrote something along the lines of "I enjoyed your account of what could have happened and your sarcasm makes it humorous but you should focus on staying with the 5-paragragh format." Then I remember she thought my book report on The Catcher in the Rye was funny. But as I went on, it sort became more about marks than writing in a way that I enjoy. Because if you write something like my Romeo + Juliet essay but in the proper form, there would be teachers that would like it and give it a high mark, and others who didn't like that I didn't "take it seriously." So it just became easier to do whatever the teacher expected for a high mark (I know A LOT of people feel the same way in my graduating class).

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McGill Arts '12

So, I have just been to U of T and back, and I am very tempted to rethink my choice. I like the curriculum at UofT so much better because the first year math/cs courses are separated into courses for people that intend to specialize in those fields and courses for people that just have to take them as prerequisites. As well, I can do a science degree at U of T an never have to take a single science course, which is awesome. I will be able to take intro to econ, intro to poli sci and all my math/cs courses. I have actually picked all my first year courses for U of T and McGill now.

Tmhlee, you just made me realize that I actually am going to have 10 grade 12 credits by the end of the year. I am also doing RCM piano, I am going to get my gr 8 by the end of the year. Have you done it already? How did you do?

.

I am pretty sure that this is what most teachers at my school do. I even have teachers that admit to it (albeit jokingly, but we all know it's true). I am excited for uni econ for one reason. My econ teacher said that the course content is basically the same as Grade 12 economics, so if you did well in Grade 12, its almost an easy A. Front row FTW, lol. I have never sat in the front row before, but I will have to get used to it. In HS, the back row is so much more tempting, because then you can pretend that the teachers don't know that you aren't paying attention.

When I write essays, I get a lot of don't use sarcasm here and comments like that, but for reports that are supposed to be impersonal, I guess that it makes sense that we aren't allowed to put too much personality in to them.

Also, I guess that I am not the only one that has watched the utours video (way too many times). Ahhhhh, I am so excited for next year. Why isn't HS over yet??

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University of Toronto: Engineering Science 1T2

You guys are crazy! I'm so glad that I only have one "top" school as my option. I would hate to be indecisive and then think "Did I pick the right university?"

tmhlee- does this mean that you've picked McGill?

any lurkers out there wanting advice? we need to liven this joint up a bit. i find it weird that on a studentawards site, there are so few people thinking of going to McG's.

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McGill Arts '12

http://coursecalendar.mcgill.ca/ugcal200809/wwhelp/wwhimpl/js/html/wwhelp.htm

You have 3 electvies over 2 terms if you do the Science Freshman Program.

I've been accepted to Guelph, Waterloo and Carleton, none of which really compare to McGill in terms of academic rigor or location. Although they are all offering me scholarships, but whatever. A couple grand doesn't make that much of a different in the long run, and I'd rather have a great 4 years and end up with more debt than less debt in some small city.

Yeah, the only thing I'm kind of not a fan is the whole language prerequisite for Arts General. I don't know, language is a really a tough call to make, because being able to converse and actually getting the grammar part of it down are two very different things. I thought about taking some intermediate level Russian since I understand it, but my writing and reading is at the level of maybe a second grader, but I want to learn something new, so maybe French. I actually thought about taking Intro to Latin since I hea it helps a fair bit in Law School, but I have a feeling I would tank that in about three seconds.

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McGill Arts '12

heythereb, beat me to the punch. Also, YOU SPEAK RUSSIAN!!! (that's the coolest thing I have ever heard) All I can speak is extremely sub-par French. Also, aren't you guys learning French with the Explore program?

tmhlee, you are lucky that we are rushing to help you with your dilemna, lol.

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University of Toronto: Engineering Science 1T2