8 ms·

McGill is not a great university, but it isn't poor either. It doesn't have the pride that Waterloo (our MIT) or Toronto (our... Columbia? Dartmouth? We don't h

McGill is not a great university, but it isn't poor either. It doesn't have the pride that Waterloo (our MIT) or Toronto (our... Columbia? Dartmouth? We don't have a Harvard or Yale) has, but it's solidly mid-tier. And this does not surprise me one bit. I've met engineers failing out during first year at Waterloo that didn't know the second law of thermodynamics ("why don't we put wind turbines on top of electric cars?") I've met engineers failing out during first year that didn't understand basic units (ie, velocity (m/s) times time(s) equals meters (m = m/ss). Fuck, I even went to a private school and when a teacher went on maternity leave a history teacher had to teach grade 11 math. After a week I told her I would do it (and I did it) because she couldn't even handle basic, basic y = mx + b stuff, let alone hyperbolas. The worst part of the whole thing is that Canadian students know* our system is fucked. We have so many immigrants from countries like India and their kids are years ahead of us, but nobody cares! I was screaming about how I hadn't learned anything in math between grade 4 and 8. Nothing. Think about that. We did fraction math for four and a half years. The whole system rewards minimizing absolute failures until around grade 10 or 11. Then people can finally split up into different achievement levels. It is insane. Also, we underpay our teachers and we don't pay more for math teachers. So for someone like me, I can either earn $200k running a tech company with my Applied Science Bachelors or I can go back to school to get an education degree and earn less than what I earned coming out of university.

jordigh 12y ago
> McGill is not a great university It still ranks pretty high: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/McGill_University#Rankings_and_reputation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/McGill_University#Rankings_and... and they still sell those "Harvard: The McGill of America" sweatshirts every year. https://glasgowuniversityabroad0910.wordpress.com/2009/10/16/harvard-americas-mcgill/ https://glasgowuniversityabroad0910.wordpress.com/2009/10/16... That B. Ed. students are coming so unprepared from McGill is quite sad. Its liberal arts programme is also much bigger than Waterloo's, but comparable to UofT's.
- 100timesthis 12y ago
  >"Harvard: The McGill of America" mmm and they didn't realize that McGill is in America too? May be the parent post has a point...
  - jordigh 12y ago
    As a Mexican, I don't like it much either, but I'm also tired of trying to convince the world that America isn't the US. Here is some consolation: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=29g57XTYgLE https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=29g57XTYgLE
    - lotharbot 12y ago
      There are three [0] "America"s -- North, South, and United States of. Clarification is only required when context is inadequate to distinguish between them. Similarly, "star" can refer to a shape, a celestial body, or a talented/lead performer or athlete. You wouldn't interrupt a conversation about sports to say "stars aren't just guys like LeBron James; Aldebaran is also a star." That would be asinine and obnoxious. So please, out of respect for everyone's time and sanity, learn how to use contextual clues and stop trying to argue that "America isn't the US". [0] OK, there are actually even more "America"s -- a band, multiple cities, ships, movies, etc. But the contextual clues in this post suggested we had "large regions of land" in mind, so I left the other forms of "America" for the footnote.
      - jordigh 12y ago
        > "America isn't the US". Depends whom I'm talking to. When I talk to you and others like you, I'll be careful to note that unqualified "America" to you almost always means "the United States". It never meant that to me growing up, nor to a bunch of other people. However, due to the global influence of the US, most of the world considers "America" to be the "US". It's not really about context or anything that could be called objective. It just means different things to different people. And because for me "America" has very emotional meanings (such as for example, Morelos' proclamation that "... so Americans may only be distinguished by vice or virtue"[1] or Luis Miguel's song "América"[2], or Las Águilas del América [3]), I will never personally accept the meaning of "US" for "America". You may have other emotional attachments to the meaning of "America", so I will try to respect those when I use the word around you or others like you. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sentimientos_de_la_Naci%C3%B3n https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sentimientos_de_la_Naci%C3%B3n [2] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SL3u7qU_09w https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SL3u7qU_09w [3] note their logo: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Club_Am%C3%A9rica https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Club_Am%C3%A9rica
hdevalence 12y ago
Somewhat unrelated, but if you had to pick an American school that Toronto would be 'our version of', Harvard is probably a better bet than Columbia: > from 2000 to 2004 U of T professors produced more publications in the fields indexed by Thomson Scientific than faculty at any other public research university worldwide... the University of Toronto stands second only to Harvard in publications among all private and public universities. (The numbers are a bit out of date, but Toronto's relative place among Canadian universities is probably unchanged).
woud420 12y ago
McGill is a great university for a lot of the more "classical" fields. However, you're right, McGill is far from being the top engineering university in Quebec.
danielweber 12y ago
I was screaming about how I hadn't learned anything in math between grade 4 and 8. Nothing. Think about that. We did fraction math for four and a half years I ended up being taught the same thing many times in math classes, but I noticed that my classmates -- even in honors classes -- had completely forgotten the last time we had learned this. They insisted they had never seen it before. The teachers had been through this many times so they weren't surprised. I don't know why I could remember it when other students cannot. A tiny part of me says that those kids hated math and shoved it out of their brain as soon as they could. I'm not sure that's fair of me. My wife says it isn't and that I'm the unusual one with the math brain.
- TheOtherHobbes 12y ago
  I think a surprising number of people simply can't math. This seems incredible if you're one of the people who can math. But really, I've known otherwise bright people whose brains fall apart at the first hint of abstraction. Basic arithmetic is fine, but you can forget about trying to teach them anything more complicated. Simple equations? Trig? Basic stats? They just can't do them, no matter how many times you repeat the explanations, or how many different ways you try to present them. So I think it's not unlikely that an aptitude for math and symbolic abstraction is unusual, and not something you're going to find in most of the population. Remember, by the time you get to a university you're in the top 20% of the population anyway. (More like 10% for STEM.) So it's maybe not so realistic to assume that's how most people are.
  - danielweber 12y ago
    There are two theses I have, not sure which is right: 1. Those people biologically can't math. (Alternatively, we are the mutants who can math.) 2. Culture has given them math anxiety, which causes panic when being asked to do math.
    - tlear 12y ago
      I think it just that Math requires abstraction and abstraction is genuinely hard. Because it is hard and highly desired skill very few teachers are good at it
ctdonath 12y ago
when a teacher went on maternity leave a history teacher had to teach grade 11 math Likewise, in grade 11 the trigonometry teacher had to leave and the wrestling coach had to fill in. The students had to teach him the material.
edias 12y ago
From what I've heard McGill is very dependent by program, and education is by all accounts by far the worst program they offer.

jordigh 12y ago

> McGill is not a great university It still ranks pretty high: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/McGill_University#Rankings_and_reputation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/McGill_University#Rankings_and... and they still sell those "Harvard: The McGill of America" sweatshirts every year. https://glasgowuniversityabroad0910.wordpress.com/2009/10/16/harvard-americas-mcgill/ https://glasgowuniversityabroad0910.wordpress.com/2009/10/16... That B. Ed. students are coming so unprepared from McGill is quite sad. Its liberal arts programme is also much bigger than Waterloo's, but comparable to UofT's.

100timesthis 12y ago
>"Harvard: The McGill of America" mmm and they didn't realize that McGill is in America too? May be the parent post has a point...
- jordigh 12y ago
  As a Mexican, I don't like it much either, but I'm also tired of trying to convince the world that America isn't the US. Here is some consolation: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=29g57XTYgLE https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=29g57XTYgLE
  - lotharbot 12y ago
    There are three [0] "America"s -- North, South, and United States of. Clarification is only required when context is inadequate to distinguish between them. Similarly, "star" can refer to a shape, a celestial body, or a talented/lead performer or athlete. You wouldn't interrupt a conversation about sports to say "stars aren't just guys like LeBron James; Aldebaran is also a star." That would be asinine and obnoxious. So please, out of respect for everyone's time and sanity, learn how to use contextual clues and stop trying to argue that "America isn't the US". [0] OK, there are actually even more "America"s -- a band, multiple cities, ships, movies, etc. But the contextual clues in this post suggested we had "large regions of land" in mind, so I left the other forms of "America" for the footnote.
    - jordigh 12y ago
      > "America isn't the US". Depends whom I'm talking to. When I talk to you and others like you, I'll be careful to note that unqualified "America" to you almost always means "the United States". It never meant that to me growing up, nor to a bunch of other people. However, due to the global influence of the US, most of the world considers "America" to be the "US". It's not really about context or anything that could be called objective. It just means different things to different people. And because for me "America" has very emotional meanings (such as for example, Morelos' proclamation that "... so Americans may only be distinguished by vice or virtue"[1] or Luis Miguel's song "América"[2], or Las Águilas del América [3]), I will never personally accept the meaning of "US" for "America". You may have other emotional attachments to the meaning of "America", so I will try to respect those when I use the word around you or others like you. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sentimientos_de_la_Naci%C3%B3n https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sentimientos_de_la_Naci%C3%B3n [2] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SL3u7qU_09w https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SL3u7qU_09w [3] note their logo: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Club_Am%C3%A9rica https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Club_Am%C3%A9rica

hdevalence 12y ago

Somewhat unrelated, but if you had to pick an American school that Toronto would be 'our version of', Harvard is probably a better bet than Columbia: > from 2000 to 2004 U of T professors produced more publications in the fields indexed by Thomson Scientific than faculty at any other public research university worldwide... the University of Toronto stands second only to Harvard in publications among all private and public universities. (The numbers are a bit out of date, but Toronto's relative place among Canadian universities is probably unchanged).

woud420 12y ago

McGill is a great university for a lot of the more "classical" fields. However, you're right, McGill is far from being the top engineering university in Quebec.

danielweber 12y ago

I was screaming about how I hadn't learned anything in math between grade 4 and 8. Nothing. Think about that. We did fraction math for four and a half years I ended up being taught the same thing many times in math classes, but I noticed that my classmates -- even in honors classes -- had completely forgotten the last time we had learned this. They insisted they had never seen it before. The teachers had been through this many times so they weren't surprised. I don't know why I could remember it when other students cannot. A tiny part of me says that those kids hated math and shoved it out of their brain as soon as they could. I'm not sure that's fair of me. My wife says it isn't and that I'm the unusual one with the math brain.

TheOtherHobbes 12y ago
I think a surprising number of people simply can't math. This seems incredible if you're one of the people who can math. But really, I've known otherwise bright people whose brains fall apart at the first hint of abstraction. Basic arithmetic is fine, but you can forget about trying to teach them anything more complicated. Simple equations? Trig? Basic stats? They just can't do them, no matter how many times you repeat the explanations, or how many different ways you try to present them. So I think it's not unlikely that an aptitude for math and symbolic abstraction is unusual, and not something you're going to find in most of the population. Remember, by the time you get to a university you're in the top 20% of the population anyway. (More like 10% for STEM.) So it's maybe not so realistic to assume that's how most people are.
- danielweber 12y ago
  There are two theses I have, not sure which is right: 1. Those people biologically can't math. (Alternatively, we are the mutants who can math.) 2. Culture has given them math anxiety, which causes panic when being asked to do math.
  - tlear 12y ago
    I think it just that Math requires abstraction and abstraction is genuinely hard. Because it is hard and highly desired skill very few teachers are good at it

ctdonath 12y ago

when a teacher went on maternity leave a history teacher had to teach grade 11 math Likewise, in grade 11 the trigonometry teacher had to leave and the wrestling coach had to fill in. The students had to teach him the material.

edias 12y ago

From what I've heard McGill is very dependent by program, and education is by all accounts by far the worst program they offer.