Katsvo Posted August 27, 2009 Report Share Posted August 27, 2009 Hi, so far I have only been reading this forum and I have found it extremely helpful, so thank you all!! There are two things however that I can't find here anywhere. I got my masters in the UK, well all my education is from Europe, mostly UK, and I don't know how it works here, but there, not having published anything as a masters student is totally normal. Only lucky few in some good field get to publish stuff as students. My field is psychology and nobody even expected us to submit stuff to journals because its 'way out of our reach', even more so because we only have one piece of research to do during the whole time and that was for our dissertation... so when I look at UoT admissions of grad students and their emphasis on research, I don't stand a chance! So i guess my question is can i apply as an undergrad if i am about to hand in my dissertation for masters..? do i tick a box on the application or do they put me in the 'grad' or 'ugrad' pile themselves? Similarly, our marks are 'officially' on the scale 0-100%, in reality, the lowest mark to get is 32 and highest is 80. I graduated with first class, and got a distinction coming for masters (so far), but that means above 70% average, which is very good and I was the only one in my undergrad and grad class to achieve it. BUT here 70%.. well you know! I know i need to get my grades translated by WES, but I keep wondering my gpa will be very low, because officially uk marking is on the scale to 100 not 80. Do any of you have any experience with UK marking and what does 70 translate to in canadian gpa? Thank you! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
future_doc Posted August 27, 2009 Report Share Posted August 27, 2009 Welcome Katsvo, throw your hat into the ring of this lottery and see what happens, anything is possible, start with WES, I assume you have MCAT behind you. I am unable to answer any of your questions really, but go for it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Neptune Posted August 27, 2009 Report Share Posted August 27, 2009 Similarly, our marks are 'officially' on the scale 0-100%, in reality, the lowest mark to get is 32 and highest is 80. I graduated with first class, and got a distinction coming for masters (so far), but that means above 70% average, which is very good and I was the only one in my undergrad and grad class to achieve it. BUT here 70%.. well you know! I know i need to get my grades translated by WES, but I keep wondering my gpa will be very low, because officially uk marking is on the scale to 100 not 80. Do any of you have any experience with UK marking and what does 70 translate to in canadian gpa? Thank you! Have you looked at the WES scales? They translate a UK 70% to an A. (See here.) Dalhousie posts their own conversion scale on their website. I also have some UK marks courtesy of a semester abroad, and I was simply advised to include a note with my application to remind the admissions committee that my marks need to be translated before they calculate my GPA. Easy as pie. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Katsvo Posted August 27, 2009 Author Report Share Posted August 27, 2009 Thank you both! Neptune, i never saw the pages you posted, that is great help, i'm so relieved! Thanks. I haven't done MCATs yet, studying for it now, taking a bit more time cos haven't seen chemistry and physics since high school properly.. going to do it in April, that should be enough.. Good luck to both of you! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Neptune Posted August 27, 2009 Report Share Posted August 27, 2009 To follow this up, I also have a Master's with no publications. I don't think it's too big a deal in general, although if you are planning on entering a research-based program the publications would be a bonus. I think most academics realise that grad school is a bit of a crapshoot. Sometimes you get a great project that produces results quickly, and at other times you can slave away for years at an impossible task and at the end of the day you realise the whole project needs to be canned. On the whole, if you have good marks and good reference from your Master's that should count towards you. A PhD with no publications would be a big eyebrow-raiser, but for a Master's it's not that uncommon, and certainly isn't taken as a sure sign of incompetence. My problem was essentially that my whole set of experiments done over the course of a few years resulted in scientifically uninteresting negative results. There was no way in hell we'd have been able to publish anything. (I mean really, who'd want to look at blank graphs and photos of failed experiments anyway?) Faced with the prospect of having to start a new project from scratch in order to get my name on a paper, I basically said 'thanks, but no thanks' and walked away with my degree. Best of luck for the MCAT, all I can advise is to cram like the ****ens and write every practise exam you can get your hands on. Best, Neptune Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Katsvo Posted August 27, 2009 Author Report Share Posted August 27, 2009 Thanks Neptune, that's exactly my situation: I slaved the whole year to get my hands on as many participants as possible (could only use males) and was not even allowed to offer any compensation and, well, my study was on pain, so you can imagine the crowds of volunteers.. haha. anyway, i got it done and found- big nothing! so now i can just write it up, get my diploma and walk away.. and i've had enough of research! So not going for Md/PhD. I was referring to the admission process for graduate applicants to UoT,that is why I thought that not having published anything is a gigantic red flag... but I will try anyway :-) Good luck to you as well, and thanks. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Slashsev01 Posted August 27, 2009 Report Share Posted August 27, 2009 Isnt there a something about how international students dont get accepted to ONT schools? -u did you undergrad here?or UK? r u a can resident? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Katsvo Posted August 28, 2009 Author Report Share Posted August 28, 2009 UoT and Mac accept visa students as far as I know, some others as well. I've done my undergrad in the UK. I'm not a resident yet. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Star1234 Posted August 30, 2009 Report Share Posted August 30, 2009 UoT and Mac accept visa students as far as I know, some others as well. I've done my undergrad in the UK. I'm not a resident yet. You should look into McGill too. I think they generally accept about 9 international students/year. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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