Well I’m just finishing up my Associates Degree, and I think I want to go farther. I can use it to pay the bills but I’d like to see how far I can really go. Toronto seems like a great place. It’s got a nice vibrant city life, something I’d like to experience after growing up in rural Michigan. Even better, it’s near my home state but in a completely foreign country!
Even better one of it’s degree offerings really seems cool. They have a Computer Science degree with an Artificial Intelligence option. I have an online friend up there studying and it sounds really interesting.
Now potential problems:
I’m American
I messed up in high school, but passed the GED cold testing with really high scores, an 800 in Social Studies, and a 780 in Science, both 99 percentile, and 85 percentile for Math. So it’s not like I wasn’t learning or anything. I just did a lot of learning on my own. The one test I did very poor on was writing (duh right?:p). I do have good grades for my associates degree, and I’m very confident I could get references from my teachers that I was a motivated learner that went beyond the course requirements.
The U of T site mentions high SAT scores. I’m pretty confident for that except the math, SAT tests up to trigonometry, and the highest Math I’ve had is Algebra 1, and of course the writing. Still I’ve learned a lot of writing since the GED so I think I do okay on that, and I’m planning on taking some Math courses and working up to calculus while I work and save up for 4 year school, wherever it is.
So do I have a shot at this? Anything that could improve my chances?
Unfortunately, I can;t help with the OP’s question–I never went to U of T–but I do have this piece of minor trivia: U of T is one of the few non-US educational institutions to have a .edu web address. You can actually get to it via www.toronto.edu. I believe this was given out in the very early days of the web, before .edu was restricted to the US. The U of T web site is normally accessed via www.utoronto.ca and does not mention this at all.
It’s my understanding that Canadian Universities in general recruit from the international market because they can charge more, and make a larger profit obviously. International students are a cash cow for Canadian schools.
That is indeed true. I looked up tuition and housing costs awhile ago and it was IIRC around $20,000 for international students and like a third to half of that for residents.
They do the same at college I’m attending now. In-district students a charged $77 a contact hour but out of district and international students are charged $144 a contact hour.
My cégep is both outside the US (obviously) and not a four-year degree-granting institution, and still managed to wangle a .edu address back in the day, which it still uses.
I don’t know any Americans who went to the University of Toronto, but I do know several who went to McGill. I don’t think it’s especially difficult for international students to get into any university, no matter the country. It’s not like a job, where companies try to hire nationals before foreigners, because the visa issues are so complex - foreigns students are desirable because they have to pay more, and because they add diversity to the student body, which is seen as a positive for attracting future students.
So my guess is that your nationality wouldn’t be a big issue. I’d be more concerned about your academic status. I don’t know how they would feel about it at UT, but at my undergrad institution (the University of California) they don’t care about your high school grades and you don’t have to take the SATs if you have an AA. Your AA grades are all they look at.
Obviously, UT may do things differently, and not knowing anything about it myself, I recommend you call the UT admissions department and see what their policy regarding accepting transfer students is.
Side comment - make sure you get the 4 year degree when you go there. Some schools based on the UK educational model grant a bachelors after the equivalent of only 3 years worth of units. Some US based graduate programs will not take you into their graduate program unless you did the fourth year.
I don’t think U of T still gives three-year degrees - I went to York and they still did, although I know only two people who took the option and I think the school is phasing it out. </irrelevant comment>
I don’t know about different processes for international students, but in general it’s not at all hard to apply to Canadian universities for general arts and sciences programs. Just fill out the paperwork and send it in. No essays, personal statements or recommendations. (That of course can depend on the program, especially when it comes to professional degrees. But usually not for things like computer science.) So I would contact the admissions department and ask for instructions, and make the application. It shouldn’t even take that much time.
Graduate of the Arts and Sciences, 1995 MA, University of Toronto, speaking here. And, yes, an American.
I didn’t find it difficult at all to get in. In fact, the application process for U of T was actually easier than that for Virginia, Minnesota, Indiana, and Ohio State, the other four grad schools where I applied. U of T certainly responded to my application faster than the other four.
U of T didn’t need my GRE scores. I’m not certain whether you will need to send your SAT scores, but they certainly won’t hurt.
I can’t of course answer for U of T as to why I was accepted, but in talking with a few professors there, and in getting to know one of the VPs for admission (who happened also to be a history professor), it seems that one major benefit in my application was my previous experience in studying abroad. The consensus was that if I’d successfully studied at Leeds Uni in the UK, U of T should be no major problem either. I don’t know if you have experience studying outside of the US, but if you don’t, that might be something you should address in your application.
U of T has a lot of foreign students (I had friends there from Kenya, Zambia, New Zealand, Finland, Sri Lanka, and the UK, to name a few) and to be honest their success in getting foreign students has lulled them into a sense of security in handling internationals. And they’ll want to know what makes you special–why should they accept you, instead of the person from another country even farther away who also wants that CompSci/AI place?
Best of luck to you, and drop me a line if you need to know anything else.
The OP is applying to complete a BA, I believe. It wouldn’t be nearly the selective process that you went through, Duke.
Again, check with admissions people but you might have to have introductory calculus down since they’d want it from Ontario high school grads. And the equivalent of that evil, evil algebra and geometry/discrete math course, the one that I stuck out for an entire week before fleeing to OAC French.
Okay, when I went to high school in Ontario, we still had the optional five-year program for university-bound students, which had a grade 13. We got a regular high-school diploma after grade 12 and a Honours dimplma after grade 13, and it was in this year that they gave us all the calculus, algebra, relations & functions, etc. It was fun.
I beg to differ on the fun part. Even without the perverted finite math teacher who breathed down my neck while assisting me learn permutations, it was torturous. Obviously not of relevance to the OP who wants to do comp sci!
I was the last year of the OAC program - the top half of the dreaded double cohort. I avoided it by graduating high school a year early, and university about six years late.
(By the time I was in high school, credentialism (thank you, Agent Foxtrot) made it so that no one left after four years without doing OAC courses. Doing so would have been nearly akin to dropping out of grade 10. :rolleyes:)
Large public universities are generally pretty upfront about how they do admissions, at least in the US and I’d assume Toronto is similar. And they will often have school- and department-specific requirements that can change from year to year. So your best bet is to go to the website and/or call them up get it right from the horse’s mouth.
I grew up a few hours from Toronto, it’s a really great city and the university has a excellent reputation for CS, but I wouldn’t set your sights just on them unless living in Toronto is in fact your #1 priority. Otherwise I would suggesting picking a few other possible 4-year schools, in places you’d want to live in, and ask the same admissions questions of them. I suspect what will come up is that the math will be very important and the writing will be a non-issue. But again, get it right from them.
If you want foreign have you thought about doing study abroad? If you’re not too fussy about the destination then I’d bet you can find a program with classes in English and in your major (CS is pretty ubiquitous) and generally speaking you can use financial aid.
some thoughts in case they are helpful, sorry for not really answering the question.
I don’t know about U of T, but if you’re breathing and can pay the tuition (about $10K per year) you can probably get into McGill. The reason is that during the salad days, they (over)expanded and now are stuck with the enlarged faculty, physical plant, etc.
I had English, French, and Art as well as the maths, Physics and Chemistry. We actually got to use E=mc[sup]2[/sup] in an exercise. Electron orbitals, man those were weird.
Well I’ve looked on their site but it seemed more geared to high school students. High grades, high SATs. I do plan to apply after I finish Math and take the SATs.
Thank you, I will!
Indeed I am! However someday I might go for an MA, or maybe a PHd, but one bite at a time.
I checked into it the Math today. According to one of the guidance counselors, using the Accuplacer I tested into intermediate Algebra when I took the entrance exam, so by the time I’m done saving up I should have Calculus down. There’s three Calculus classes, and I need to take Intermediate, and Advanced Algebra, then Trigonometry, and then I can start Calculus.
Good thinking. Tomorrow when I have some free time I’m gonna draft up an email with my situation, and how I plan to improve it and send into their Admissions and see if they have any advice.
These are very help thoughts. I have thought of studying abroad. The biggest draw for Toronto is it’s close to home. I’ve lived in another part of the country, but I got very homesick. Toronto has the advantage of being about an 8 to 10 hour drive from my home. I figure homesickness will be lessened quite a bit if a visit is a weekend trip down highway 401.
That said thinking it all out, maybe I’d better off finishing up a 4 year degree in state and then going to Toronto for a Masters or PHd. I think I’d get where I want to go a lot quicker. The U of T transfer policies don’t look too promising, something else to ask about in my email. If I have to start from scratch that’s a lot of wasted time and money.
Obviously not of relevance to the OP who wants to do comp sci!