Quebec Applicant - A Few Questions...

[Haribo7173]

Hi,

 

I'm a student currently residing in Montreal. I'm about to complete my bachelor of science in psychology at McGill University and I'm interested in applying to pharmacy in Ontario (at Waterloo and UofT) for the Fall of 2017. My current CGPA is a 3.71 which I'm hoping to increase by the time I've graduated.

 

1. However, I am still missing some pre-requisite courses for my application, namely: Genetics, Organic 2, Microbiology, Biochem for Waterloo and Organic 2, Physical Chemistry and Biochem for U of T (these courses are not required for pharmacy applications in Quebec). I will most likely be completing these courses as an independent student during the 2015-2016 calendar year. However, I know that having a full course load is important for both U of T and Waterloo and so I am wondering whether or not I'll be disadvantaged for completing these courses on a part-time basis after having completed my undergraduate degree. Furthermore, during my undergraduate degree (which is 3 years long here), I withdrew from one course (for reasons that I can explain in an interview) and took a class in the summer to make up for that withdrawal. Therefore, in my 6 semesters as an undergrad, I will have had a full course load (5 classes) in every semester except for one. Could this hurt my chances?

 

2. For anyone who was once in my situation, I'm curious as to where you think I should take the remaining prereqs: at McGill, at Concordia or maybe even in a CEGEP (if the courses are offered). I'm assuming McGill courses are tougher than Concordia courses so it may be smarter if I simply become an independent student at Concordia. 

 

3. Does anyone know how these pre-req marks will be counted in the overall CGPA? Are they simply added onto my undergrad CGPA? As for the CEGEP pre-reqs (which I suppose they look at as well), how will they be counted, considering a different marking scheme is used in CEGEP?

 

4. Would you say that a 3.71 (and hopefully 3.75 by the time I graduate) is a good CGPA to be considered for an interview and even for admission at both UofT and Waterloo? The websites don't seem to specify what the average GPA of admitted students has been in the last few years...or even what the GPA of the last admitted student was...

 

5. Does anyone know of any other Canadian universities (outside Quebec) with a pharmacy program that don't have any quotas or restrictions when it comes to out-of-province applicants? I know Dalhousie or Saskatchewan barely take any out-of-province students for example. 

 

6. This question is mostly for Quebec residents/students: I'm applying to pharmacy at Universite de Montreal and Universite Laval this year as well but I know I'm somewhat disadvantaged because the CRU for psychology is rather low. I'm still going to give it a try because who knows! But if I were to start another undergrad at UdeM next year to hopefully boost my grades and apply to UdeM and Laval AGAIN (and forget about doing the pre-reqs for universities outside of Canada), what undergrad would you suggest I do? I'm assuming I should complete an undergrad in the "connexe" category to have greater chances. Do you think this would be worthwhile? Or should I simply focus on the pre-reqs for UofT and Waterloo and just forget about pharmacy schools in Quebec in general?

 

Any help would be appreciated!!! Thank you!

[Abi Radison]

Hi there, 

 

You have a very long post. I am going to do my best here.

 

1. It is best to have a full course load at all times. I do not think having one semester that was not full course load will hurt your chances. 

 

2. I strongly suggest you exhaust all of your options at all universities and do not narrow it down to only those in Ontario. Once you get accepted you can choose which location is most suitable for you. 

As for your pre-req, I do not think it makes a huge difference as where you do them as long as you perform well. I think if you were to apply to University of Montreal for phamracy or your second degree then do them there. If you want to apply to Laval, then do them at University of Laval. It will look like an "insider" to them once you do your application for pharm.

 

3. They have their own conversion system. a 4.0/4.3 is approximately equivalent to an R score of 32.00

 

4. I think your GPA is good, but remember the higher the better. U ofT requires PCAT. Also, Waterloo is one of the best pharmacy schools in Canada. 

 

5. All Universities have restrictions regarding out of province applicants. I know that even In Manitoba they take NO ONE from out of province, according to my latest update. 

 

6. It depends where you want to go. If you absolutely want to move to Ontario, then focus on pre-req and doing PCAT but remember 1) these are tops schools 2) they do not take a lot of out of province

 

as for doing an undergrad I suggest you either do Biology ( a bit easier to get high grades but it will not give a major boost) or Biomedical sciences ( where is a bit harder because everyone who did not get into medical school is in biomed. Everyone has solid GPA in biomed BUT if you have A+ in bio and somebody else has A+ in biomed, they will take the one from biomed)

 

I hope this helps.

[Katie94]

Hello, 

 

I'll just add my two cents, 

 

1. For having a full course load, a rep from UofT pharm told me that one semester without one wouldn't matter, they're looking to see that you can handle it since you can't to pharmacy part time

3. My understanding is that all marks are counted equally

4. Ontario schools don't look at GPA, they use %average, the posted averages are 70% and 75% for UofT and UW, but UofT also states that the median entering average previous years is closer to 80%

5. To my knowledge, ontario is the only province that doesn't have restrictions on out of province students

6. If you are aiming for laval or UdeM, look on on laval's website for the indice de force of different programs, biology is pretty low so you may want to avoid that... there is more info on the quebec forums for which programs are best (I'm from ontario applying to quebec so not sure on the best programs but from what I've read, biology is not one)

 

good luck

[Sam787]

interesting