WHY McGILL?

Oh damnit. Sorry about the late post. Planner was just a filler post because I didn't finish writing this one as quickly as I thought I would. Here's a picture of that planner, by the way, from the Barnes and Noble Website*:

I’m still trying to decide on how many posts I want to put up in a week. But I’ve decided that instead of worrying about this, I’ll worry about writing the darned things first.

Plus, I’m currently applying for a Study Permit from Canada which I wanted to do after I got my CAQ (don’t worry if you have no idea what this means – I’ll bitch about it in a later post about international paperwork). It’s a pain in the ass.

And to make things even worse, because my life is obviously so terrible (Joke, let’s keep things relative. I’m not that bad-off), the first draft of this blog post was somehow lost in the sweep when I was trying to kill my laptop’s first viruses ever. I woke up, opened the laptop and had a million pop-ups and weird advertisements about Trojan viruses. “I’m a new virus scanner that you never installed but I found a bunch of Trojans and you need to pay me to get rid of them.” Yeah, okay, virus, you can’t fool me. I’ve had tons before from my older desktop, but I never thought my Toshiba laptop baby would ever have to deal with this crap.

But I’ve been totally off-topic for the first few paragraphs. Let’s rewind.

One of the main differences between applying to an American school and McGill University (I wanted to generalize and say Canadian school, but I only applied to McGill), is that McGill doesn’t require a writing sample, extracurricular activities, recommendations, and all those warm and fuzzy things that make you, the applicant,special, just the way you are. McGill asks for your AP scores, your GPA, your school transcripts, and all the statistics that make you, the applicant, qualified, just the way you are.

And so, perhaps because I feel an emptiness, that something is lacking from such a numbers application, or perhaps because I have discovered a slow-burning, everlasting fondness for my school (eh, well, maybe), I need to compensate (or share my affection) by describing why I chose to apply to McGill – especially since I had so painstakingly explained why Penn, why Yale, why Georgetown, why Swarthmore, why Stanford, why Columbia, why Brown, and why Haverford were all my best fit(s) and first choice(s). Princeton, Harvard, and Dartmouth didn’t give a shit/ask some version of this question because they know why everyone wants to go there (multiple theres). The other Ivies have lower self-esteem.

I wish I had some sort of explanation for why I chose to apply to McGill that would show me off as a person of rational judgment and wise decision-making. But maybe you think I do. Who am I to judge whether my own actions reflected that of a teenager who acts on impulse just because I’m 17 and I know me? All those pleasant explanations for why a person chooses to apply to school – I used them to justify why I chose to attend McGill after I was accepted, when I finally decided to do a little research.

Honestly, I’d never heard of McGill before my first high school varsity debate. This was in September or October of last year, and happened to be hosted at my school. I was a judge, so I basically sat around until I had to attend a debate match and write bullshit comments about each team. Seriously, the debate league in my county has some serious issues to work out – inconsistency of judging ballots from judge to judge, organization, handling of appeals, and letting me judge. Gads. That’s another story for later when I have nothing left to write about McGill and when I have successfully made you all fall in love with me and want to know more about me.

So…at this debate, one of the top debaters from my school (I love this kid, he’s so talented&charismatic&funny) was talking to a pair of debaters (one of whom looks as if he’s had a total makeover after cutting his hair and looks pretty delish now) from a vocational school in my area. The conversation of course, between first semester high school seniors, ranged from how are yous to college to college and to COLLEGE. Before you think I’m some creepy girl standing in the corner staring at them, I wasn’t eavesdropping on their conversation – they just happened to be talking in the doorway through which all the participants of the debate walk . Talk about obnoxious, but JK, I love them. So one of the pair mentions McGill and because it happened to be international (Canada counts as international! I’ll tackle whether it fits study abroad later), which sounds romantic (international = romantic, America = America) and exciting and all that jazz, I decided to look it up.

The application was so easy to fill out, and since I saw that McGill ranked in the top 20 universities in the world on multiple ranking sites/was known as “Harvard of Canada” (don’t worry, I’m slightly less shallow now), I decided to give it a go.

I was outright rejected by Swarthmore, Brown, Harvard, Princeton, and Stanford. I was rejected by Yale after being deferred from early action. I was rejected by Columbia, Dartmouth, Georgetown, and Penn after being waitlisted. I rejected Haverford’s waitlist. I was accepted to McGill, Middlebury, and The College of New Jersey (TCNJ). Yeah, I was, and still am, pretty crushed by the rejection. It kind of bruised my ego – so don’t bring it up if you meet me in person. I may cry – or rip your hair out.

Moving on, I had to choose between these three schools. On why I chose McGill from these three schools, I think my answer on Formspring.com to the question Why McGill explained it nicely enough -- though it was a censored version (censored to be more pleasant and slightly less judgmental) from four months ago (I was still on the waitlist for several schools):

My 3 choices were TCNJ, Middlebury, and McGill. Now, before I go any further, I just want to say that they are all great schools, and I mean no disrespect with my judgments of them. I mean, I liked them enough to apply – but when forced to choose, a variety of reasons led me to McGill.

I immediately decided that I would not attend TCNJ because it was my safety school. Solid academics, yes, but a little too close to home. When I visited on a Saturday, I can't say the campus was bustling with activity. And lastly, I don't like the name of the school. The College of New Jersey? Can you get any blander? "What school do you attend?" "The College of New Jersey" ...Sorry TCNJ-ers, it's not my thing. Besides, one of the main buildings is named Paul Loser Hall. I've been informed it's pronounced "low-ser" not "loo-ser."

Next, Middlebury -- or Midd-le-of-Nowhere? Amazing academic program. I was extremely impressed by the small class sizes and the student-reported experience in academics. However, my personal experience was not so impressive. I attended an awesome lit theory class but a HORRIBLE calc I class.

To my parents, the campus was gorgeous. And to my mom, the white marble everywhere was absolutely stunning. To me, it was nice to look at...for a week, maybe. But what was I supposed to do outside of school? And the dorms were not so pretty, btw... I need my college experience to be less all-American, tradish & preppy, and more worldly. Yes, Middlebury would be very nurturing, but I wasn't really interested in such a small school. Additionally, it's a private liberal arts college. LACs are extremely costly and [Middlebury] wasn't generous enough with financial aid.

Of course, if I get off the waitlist (highly unlikely) for any of the 4 schools I decided to remain on the waitlist for--Dartmouth, Georgetown, UPenn, and Columbia--then I will have some more decision-making to do -- depending greatly on money and convenience. Columbia would be so convenient for me (fingers-crossed) at my current situation. UPenn was/is still a dream. Georgetown is in DC (which I heart).

I go on to describe Why not McGill, which I don't want to go into, because I'm sure I will have a lengthier list later. Don't get me wrong, I have a long list of Why McGill reasons that aren't even posted here. But I can't think of any right now because they're screwing me over with dorming and that's majorly pissing me off at the moment. I'm sure I will recover once I get to Montreal (on Saturday, can you believe it?!), but right now, things aren't going exactly the way I want them too, and my mild obsessive-compulsive personality (self-diagnosed) is forcing my eye to take on a permanent twitch.

But ANYHOW, though a lot more eventually did go into the choice, that's the basic historyof why I chose McGill.

Tata,

J. McGillee

*10. Add pictures to blog posts.