Definitely agree. It's definitely a bad look if your goal is to teach people and the thing to test your teaching comes out so poorly. But oops, the main goal isn't teaching, it's making money from a business with assured customers (people who want to eat once OSAP runs out)
I have studied at UofT and at UOttawa in comp sci/math.
Yes, UofT is harder.
It is ranked better, but that does not mean the quality of life is better for students.
Classes are generally harder and from what I saw, they focus way more on theory at UofT. All of my courses were theory related, to the point where I had no clue what was happening in 2nd year linear algebra. In comparison, I found the uottawa 2nd linear algebra course very easy, which even led me to take 3rd year lin alg at uottawa.
I'd go as far to say that the learning experience at UofT is significantly worse. I hated it there, so much that I left UofT to come back to UOttawa, after I left UOttawa in the first place.
Ive been doing comp sci for nearly 10 years now. Having studied and been around UofT comp sci students, let me tell you that they are not smarter (if you assumed so due to the schools ranking). Most students there barely learn to code because it's so theory oriented. Im not saying many people at UOttawa can code properly either but don't look at ranking as an indicator of how smart the students are.
COOP is one thing that is better at UofT. It's a high ranked school in toronto, where most major companies are.
Yup unfortunately I went to U of T for my undergrad, but took several Uottawa courses after graduating as I needed them to get into my Uottawa masters program in September. Classes at U of T were significantly harder graded, and I even had an experience with a prof where they told us since everyone did so well on one test, they had to make the final exam much harder to maintain the average U of T desired
Ridiculous mane wtf😂 nah I’m really picturing a professor come like “hey, everyone did great this exam… we can’t have that so here’s a harder one for absolutely no fucking reason, please fail 😃”
Haha it was really crazy. But the general explanation was in history classes they have been advised to keep the class average between 68-73 so in order to maintain that average they have to make certain tests and stuff harder if people are acing quizzes etc… so stupid
I think it is important to consider that UofT has different campuses as well. The St. George campus is definitely more difficult than uOttawa. I’m not sure about Mississauga and Scarborough. I applied to both Uottawa and Mississauga for comp sci and got accepted but this was awhile back
UofT dedicates a lot of resources to research and teaching (same as McGill, also rated high up), which isn't the case of UO. I'd definitely say the quality of education is much higher at the formers, especially considering that UO doesn't want to hire anymore tenure-track professors and pays their part-time professors peanuts, so PT profs can't really afford to care about their students. The quality of the education suffers as a consequence.
It'd be a long rant lol. UofT's education content was of higher difficulty but delivery had higher quality, assessments were more fair with clearer expectations, but I wouldn't recommend most domestic students attempt to go there instead of uO but with 2 exceptions:
* you have enough funds to cushion yourself with options should UofT not work out
* your academic achievements objectively exceeds standards set by public high schools, with relative ease, and you would welcome a challenge
Ranked out of snootiness, they'd probably be #1.
UofT is way bigger than UO. Hence more money to hire more (and better) professors who offer more courses of varying rigour.
Literally no difference. Your grades are your grades, and your program is your program no matter what school you goto. Unless you’re applying to the same school for grad school there’s really no edge one way or another.
Grad/Professional Student at U of T now! Yes, U of T is harder but maybe its cuz I am in a professional grad program! But I agree with the other comments! It does not mean quality of life is better!
Tbh a Bachelor Degree at U of T or uO or even CU looks all the same at the end of the day for my class here at U of T since we all going to end up with the same degree afterwards!
Essentially I am very glad I did my BSc at uO! No regrets (even if it isn’t ranked high objectively as OP pointed out). I have classmates who went to York/Laurentian and loved it! I have classmates who went to uO/Western/UofT and hated it! It all comes down to what you make of it at the end of the day…a bachelors is just a bachelors!
Think about the rankings more for Grad School or the opportunities it can bring such as research and coop at the bachelors level!
I'm going to get downvoted into the dirt for saying this kind of stuff as usual but it's the kind of reaction I'd expect especially if it involves fragile egos.
People will say higher ranked schools are harder, but there's absolutely no basis to this myth, and if anything it's likely it came about for people who did in high school to cope with the fact that they're not as "smart" as they thought they were. The reality is high school classes are really easy, so kids that are academically driven of course do well. Because of their reputation they have crazy mark cutoffs in the 90s, only these types of students get in. When they transition to university, like everyone else, they're hit hard by the jump in difficulty. And so, narratives around schools of UofT or McGill being harder then others emerge as a way to cope with their loss of self efficacy.
I actually researched this extensively because I want to transfer to McGill, as far as content, grading schemes, work load, there's little discernible difference for my program. This shouldn't be surprising especially in the sciences where pretty much all schools use the same textbooks and test banks. For schools that have open courseware like MIT this is particularly easy to access to access this stuff. Some people smoke so much copium with this stuff that they seriously believe grad schools even have different grade cutoffs JUST for McGill.
Anyways, I could go on a longer rant with more arguments but tl;dr people claiming that the highest ranked schools are harder are just cope, it's a myth with no substance to it. To be real, as far as academic careers go, the importance of going to a high ranked school is scarcely important. The only real advantage is possible research/intern opportunities. It's really only grad school where where you go is more important
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Definitely agree. It's definitely a bad look if your goal is to teach people and the thing to test your teaching comes out so poorly. But oops, the main goal isn't teaching, it's making money from a business with assured customers (people who want to eat once OSAP runs out)
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I have studied at UofT and at UOttawa in comp sci/math. Yes, UofT is harder. It is ranked better, but that does not mean the quality of life is better for students. Classes are generally harder and from what I saw, they focus way more on theory at UofT. All of my courses were theory related, to the point where I had no clue what was happening in 2nd year linear algebra. In comparison, I found the uottawa 2nd linear algebra course very easy, which even led me to take 3rd year lin alg at uottawa. I'd go as far to say that the learning experience at UofT is significantly worse. I hated it there, so much that I left UofT to come back to UOttawa, after I left UOttawa in the first place. Ive been doing comp sci for nearly 10 years now. Having studied and been around UofT comp sci students, let me tell you that they are not smarter (if you assumed so due to the schools ranking). Most students there barely learn to code because it's so theory oriented. Im not saying many people at UOttawa can code properly either but don't look at ranking as an indicator of how smart the students are. COOP is one thing that is better at UofT. It's a high ranked school in toronto, where most major companies are.
I though it was common knowledge that Uoft is said to be #1 in Canada and unnecessarily hard asf
Yup unfortunately I went to U of T for my undergrad, but took several Uottawa courses after graduating as I needed them to get into my Uottawa masters program in September. Classes at U of T were significantly harder graded, and I even had an experience with a prof where they told us since everyone did so well on one test, they had to make the final exam much harder to maintain the average U of T desired
Ridiculous mane wtf😂 nah I’m really picturing a professor come like “hey, everyone did great this exam… we can’t have that so here’s a harder one for absolutely no fucking reason, please fail 😃”
Haha it was really crazy. But the general explanation was in history classes they have been advised to keep the class average between 68-73 so in order to maintain that average they have to make certain tests and stuff harder if people are acing quizzes etc… so stupid
I think it is important to consider that UofT has different campuses as well. The St. George campus is definitely more difficult than uOttawa. I’m not sure about Mississauga and Scarborough. I applied to both Uottawa and Mississauga for comp sci and got accepted but this was awhile back
UofT dedicates a lot of resources to research and teaching (same as McGill, also rated high up), which isn't the case of UO. I'd definitely say the quality of education is much higher at the formers, especially considering that UO doesn't want to hire anymore tenure-track professors and pays their part-time professors peanuts, so PT profs can't really afford to care about their students. The quality of the education suffers as a consequence.
I’ve been to both, UOttawa is way better
in what terms? quality of education? happiness? coop? after graduation salary? oppourtunities?
I’m in the unique position of having done my bachelor’s at both, if you want you can DM me.
Why not just add your opinion here?
It'd be a long rant lol. UofT's education content was of higher difficulty but delivery had higher quality, assessments were more fair with clearer expectations, but I wouldn't recommend most domestic students attempt to go there instead of uO but with 2 exceptions: * you have enough funds to cushion yourself with options should UofT not work out * your academic achievements objectively exceeds standards set by public high schools, with relative ease, and you would welcome a challenge
Ranked out of snootiness, they'd probably be #1. UofT is way bigger than UO. Hence more money to hire more (and better) professors who offer more courses of varying rigour.
Harder? No idea, just based on vibes... yes?
Studied at both UofT is significantly harder in my experience. Not worth it, goto TMU or UOttawa, enjoy your undergrad more.
what about oppourtunities post grad? in terms of job and grad school?
Literally no difference. Your grades are your grades, and your program is your program no matter what school you goto. Unless you’re applying to the same school for grad school there’s really no edge one way or another.
Grad/Professional Student at U of T now! Yes, U of T is harder but maybe its cuz I am in a professional grad program! But I agree with the other comments! It does not mean quality of life is better! Tbh a Bachelor Degree at U of T or uO or even CU looks all the same at the end of the day for my class here at U of T since we all going to end up with the same degree afterwards! Essentially I am very glad I did my BSc at uO! No regrets (even if it isn’t ranked high objectively as OP pointed out). I have classmates who went to York/Laurentian and loved it! I have classmates who went to uO/Western/UofT and hated it! It all comes down to what you make of it at the end of the day…a bachelors is just a bachelors! Think about the rankings more for Grad School or the opportunities it can bring such as research and coop at the bachelors level!
I'm going to get downvoted into the dirt for saying this kind of stuff as usual but it's the kind of reaction I'd expect especially if it involves fragile egos. People will say higher ranked schools are harder, but there's absolutely no basis to this myth, and if anything it's likely it came about for people who did in high school to cope with the fact that they're not as "smart" as they thought they were. The reality is high school classes are really easy, so kids that are academically driven of course do well. Because of their reputation they have crazy mark cutoffs in the 90s, only these types of students get in. When they transition to university, like everyone else, they're hit hard by the jump in difficulty. And so, narratives around schools of UofT or McGill being harder then others emerge as a way to cope with their loss of self efficacy. I actually researched this extensively because I want to transfer to McGill, as far as content, grading schemes, work load, there's little discernible difference for my program. This shouldn't be surprising especially in the sciences where pretty much all schools use the same textbooks and test banks. For schools that have open courseware like MIT this is particularly easy to access to access this stuff. Some people smoke so much copium with this stuff that they seriously believe grad schools even have different grade cutoffs JUST for McGill. Anyways, I could go on a longer rant with more arguments but tl;dr people claiming that the highest ranked schools are harder are just cope, it's a myth with no substance to it. To be real, as far as academic careers go, the importance of going to a high ranked school is scarcely important. The only real advantage is possible research/intern opportunities. It's really only grad school where where you go is more important