Is U of T undergrad better to go to U.S than Western?

[jhkoreacanada]

Hi everyone. I am currently in first year life science at the U of T St.George campus. I am thinking of transferring to Western because I believe that I could get a higher GPA at Western. (I am getting about 3.5~ish here) Well, there are a few other reasons as well.

 

Some people have told me that in Ontario, the med schools don't really care about where you go for undergrad. This has been shown by the fact that there are more York students at U of T Med than students from U of T undergrad.

 

 

How about U.S? I have a feeling that for good med schools, they would obviously care about where you came from. Could you please tell me something about this? Thank you very much.

[MagnumMD]

You're feeling is pretty unfounded. First of all, it would mean U of T had a clearly better reputation than Western, which is arguable at best. Second, you would be assuming that the American schools have some well-placed ranking of schools that they give some sort of weight to when evaluating applications (they don't).

 

In the states, the disparity between a "good" school and a "bad" school is huge. In Canada, that's not something you need to worry about. I applied from Waterloo ("worse" than U of T and Western????) and got several American interviews and got in to all the schools that I interviewed at.

 

Your bigger concern is marks, and that 3.5 GPA might come back later to bite you in the ass because most (if not, all) American med schools look at your entire GPA. Ontario schools tend to be more merciful, weighing your last couple of years more heavily.

 

So, go wherever you think you'll do the best and don't worry about silly minutiae like the reputation of the school.

[peachy]

This has been shown by the fact that there are more York students at U of T Med than students from U of T undergrad.

I'm pretty sure that's false. The ratio of applicants:acceptances from the two schools are probably about the same, but I would suspect that the absolute numbers from U of T are much higher.

 

How about U.S? I have a feeling that for good med schools, they would obviously care about where you came from.

US institutions are very likely to lump wherever you go into "Random Canadian School" and not care beyond that.

[smood]

I have to agree with peachy. I don't know who told you there are more York students at U of t med than UT students but thats utterly false. I would be surprised to see more than 5 per year from york gaining entrance. Although they say school doesn't matter I have a fairly strong feeling that U of T turns their noses up at York students (probably the same with Ryerson students as well). The rest of the schools though are all comprable in terms of reputation.

 

But U of T is the best in terms of rep in canada... thats not even debateable. You want to debate that? Guess what... U of T discovered insulin... what did western do? Discover a method of freezing blueberries? Oh sorry that was Mac I think.

 

Now I'm not talking about the quality of a school's education, thats completely different. I'm only talking about rep.

[worriedandwaiting]

It might help to look at the GPA conversion sticky for canadian schools to US AMCAS GPA

 

At western, anything above 80% is considered 4.0 in US GPA.

[jhkoreacanada]

Thank you everyone. I think Western is a much better place to go for me because it sounds like getting my GPA high is the biggest priority. Plus, I will have a little more free time at Western, which means that I could get alot of extracurriculars done.

[n00b]

UT is definitely more well known than UWO, if that makes any difference.

[THX]

Check the schools out first, go to whichever you are more comfortable with.