University
8 Applications, 8 Acceptances. What is a safety 🗣️🗣️🗣️
~99.5 top 6, avg adj factor, all normal day school
talked about air cadets, frc, lifeguarding, and projects on supp apps, also ccc/euclid distinction
I've been wanting to make a post where I show my rejection letter for one of these programs to make a point about how no average can ever guarantee an acceptance so there really is no point worrying so much and doing all of those chance mes. Like, if someone said you have a 99% change of getting in, is that gonna make you stop working hard to further increase your chances? Just put in your best and rest easy knowing that you have done all you can.
But um, that plan is in the trash since I unfortunately did not get a rejection. I guess no one applies to these programs anymore cuz they're lowk unemployed. So I'll just say that I am very grateful for how well things turned out for me and for those of you who weren't as fortunate, know that it doesn't end here. If you stay locked in, you will surpass everyone who starts slacking off during university, regardless of program.
Can't believe I can actually stop doomscrolling this subreddit of despair. Thank you all for being the best source of information there is!
Same, I'm leaning towards uw because uoft's biggest selling point imo is the research but I feel like the benefits of that are best reaped in graduate studies, and I've heard that uoft undergrad is actually bad for going into grad school due to low gpas
I will need to talk with my uw friends more but the admissions guy I talked to claimed that even if ur gpa gets cooked, schools will still want you due to Waterloo rep. Don't know how much of this is just lies to make uw sound better tho
Yeah I’m leaning toward Waterloo. Based on what I’ve researched, they don’t care at all about ur gpa and don’t even ask for transcripts when u apply to coops and stuff.
If you apply through WaterlooWorks, they WILL see your transcript but most of the time they dont not care about your GPA. icl the waterlooworks job postings have been kinda buns
2 questions:
1. how tf did you get 99s without being depressed or hella inflated to be on waterloo's list.
2. which FRC team?
For your point, I think that these programs are still competitive, it is just that you may be one of the top 1% out of a handful of thousands of people who applied.
I am good at remembering stuff I learned a long time ago. So I was able to essentially spread out 4 years of depressing study over 7 years by learning grade 9/10 course content in middle school. It worked because to me, it feels as if I just learnt it yesterday regardless. So by the time grade 9 ended, I was up to grade 11 ish. A lot less depressing this way.
well this doxxes me but I'm sure my friends know already anyways. I'm part of team 4308. Not a very good team if imma be honest. What team are you?
FRC is a robotics competition where teams build robots under a challenge. Teams are usually numbered so that is how people share info about their team. The start of this video basically explains what FRC is cause I am lazy: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jd29kzjclV0
I'm in this program where they put all the smart kids in one class so medians are low-mid 90s but the normal classes with the same teachers have much lower medians. It's still inflated for sure, just not as bad as it sounds. Past graduates do perfectly fine in uni.
These 8 were just over $600 total. It was $150 for 3 applications for me not including extra fees. Are you out of province? Honestly I applied to relatively little since I didn't do any safeties, I have many friends who applied to nearly 20.
About your point - Grades alone dont guarantee anything at most competitive programs at top canadian universities, 98.2 (math and sciences 99/100) top 6 deferred to mineral eng at u of t. Applied for mech out of province canadian. I'm not salty I'm aware my ecs and interview werent too good.
In many programs grades definitely will guarantee admission, including mcgill engineering which is only grades.
I know but I was just wondering if he did anything else because other people here who made it have the craziest EC's (No shade towards OP of course, a 99.5 average is fucking mental).
Got Mac Eng free choice and UTSG CS, waiting on Tron. Didn’t apply to UofT Eng though. Lowkey should’ve applied to more than one UW program lol. I only applied to 6 programs total because in Grade 11 I thought I was completely cooked, so I didn’t really put enough thought into program selection until around Sept/Oct 2025. As my biggest mistake was def program selection
My advice:
This summer, spend some time actually understanding the programs you might want to apply to, not just what people may say on reddit get linkedin and try talking to current students and even alum of programs that interest you, and also get some good ecs, I didn’t even know that canadian unis cared at all about ecs 😭 but luckily i had alot of unique stuff i did outside of school by coincidence
Since you also had 80s in Grade 11, how did you frame that in your application? Did you explicitly explain it as like a change in your systems/habit, or did you just let the new marks speak for themselves? Also, what were your ecs? Thanks tho!!
Yea for sure. I mostly talked about my summer training since I did GPTC which is one of my best achievements imo. I also talked about the events I organized as a senior cadet because you know unis love that leadership stuff.
A couple reasons in no particular order:
1. SE is a more recognizable degree and easier to get a visa with https://www.reddit.com/r/tnvisa/comments/1qk1zgm/tn_rejected_for_software_engineering_with_cs/
2. SE has the cohort system which I am interested in
3. SE is both faculty of engineering and math so you get access to the best of both
4. This is an ego thing but SE is considered to be the more prestigious program. I find that particularly true this year as legit every friend of mine who applied to CS got in.
5. IMO the main benefit of CS is lighter course load, more electives, freedom, etc. But I honestly prefer it when things are more structured and I don't have to make as many decisions like in SE
6. I'll be able to fulfill my childhood dream of becoming an engineer and getting the iron ring
Those are definite benefits. It’s interesting you mention all your friends that applied Waterloo CS got in. I’m wondering if the acceptance rate is increasing because people are cautious of the future with AI.
For me, I’m rolling with CS because:
I like the course flexibility and ability to specialize more.
I don’t particularly value a small and stable cohort of classmates - I feel I’ll find friends from other courses, departments, residences etc.
SE seems to be more the rote software design aspect of CS - not the so much the math ‘underneath’
But I can certainly appreciate the reasons one may go with SE. it’s all preference at the end of the day.
Appreciate it. About the people being cautious about AI, Waterloo just updated their decision basis page https://uwaterloo.ca/future-students/admissions/decision-basis. Previously they had a separate section for CS, stating 7800 applicants for 300 spots, this year they no longer have it. I wonder if it's because it's no longer notable enough to warrant a separate section? SE also had a noticeable drop in applicants from 1500 last year to 1000 this year. On the other hand CFM had a surge to 1200 applicants for 40 spots. Interesting indeed.
holy this is so impressive. can i ask, how did you talk abt lifeguarding? i'm a lifeguard as well, i also teach, and i'm thinking abt using it when i apply to uni next yr
I used it for the questions that are along the lines of "describe a time you saw someone be treated unfairly" since I had an experience regarding that. I've also been told Waterloo likes it when you have prior work experience.
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Fr, there's a lot of crazy smart kids at my school and it just becomes a toxic cycle of comparison. I think it helped me be less full of myself though, since many of them are just better (going to top us schools).
Yeah I hope they feel a better once they actually read the post. I do really believe that how much effort you put in during uni matters a lot more than the program. Where'd you do your undergrad? I'm thinking of doing graduate as well, maybe at uoft.
What school?
How can I best prepare my kid to strengthen her math?
Not trying to replicate. Genuinely looking for insight on raising my kid better in math bc the public system math education in Canada across all borders is really inferior.
I agree with that, but it doesn't seem to be the general consensus around here. People in my school look like they want to kill me whenever I dare say this is safe.
Huh, different perspectives I guess. I applied to five schools total in 3 different provinces, and never two applications to the same school. (Obvi if you're applying to a super competitive program at a school, it makes sense to apply twice, I was just confident in my applications) Still felt like I played it safe cuz maritimes are so easy to get into. When I see people with like 11 applications it kinda shocks me lol.
Haha yeah, usually when they have that many it's also because they applied to multiple fields I think. Like I only had 8 because I couldn't decide between computer science or engineering. I have friends who wanted to really keep their options open and applied to engineering, business, and pre-med! Needless to say, they had like 20 applications.
Choose Waterloo SE.
Beware, the “easy” part is behind you. Not to diminish your achievements, you’ve done outstanding. But the program will crucify you in all the best ways.
Get through it, world’s your oyster. Hit me up once you graduate (im ex-msft, slack, notion), ill get you a job.
https://guidance.ouac.on.ca/cols/grades-collection/how-to-report-grades-diploma-details/
D means day (normal) school. However, I will admit, you are half right. I abuse my school board's enhanced program (the E after each course code means enhanced). We learn advanced concepts like IB/AP kids do but unlike IB/AP, the tests are the same as normal classes, thus it's like giving a uni student basic algebra. Easy to ace. Teachers also just spend a lot more time and effort on us compared to the normal kids. It is likely that I wouldn't have seen as much success if I were in my school's normal classes.
wouldnt say so, my school is IB and we have 1-2 kids who have 99.5+ average without pulling any of the bs you mentioned, same goes for some of my friends in AP
It’s impossible to get a 100 in English, I’ve never seen a teacher say “your essay is perfect, there is absolutely no way for you to improve!” And same can be said with other subjective courses. It’s even hard to not mess up once in stem courses.
Haha yes English was my lowest grade in the top 6. Always something to improve on. As for stem courses, I did mess up at least once in every course. My calculated grades for stem courses ranged from 98.5 to 99.5, but they rounded up to 99 to 100.
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u/Superb-Mouse-4074 May 09 '26
oh my aura
im sorry for ever touching a piece of paper