Dear Vancouver/UBC Residents.

EastcoastAR5

EastcoastAR5

Active member
Hey I currently live in New York(so going to bc would be a huge change) and am thinking of throwing a transfer application to UBC. I think it would be amazing as I am an avid biker(whistler ect) and of course skiing (whistler ect). Im just curious what you guys think of the city, atmosphere, weather, school, sports, parties, drinking age, cost of living for an american, tuition (not listed on college board for some reason, dorm arrangement(can you live on campus for 4 years?) ect. Any one from the states going there? Let me know please!! As a reference of what other schools I am applying too...Tufts/Northeastern/UConn/Skidmore/Umass. Thanks so much!!!!

 
vancouver is cool.

but you will get made fun of for being american.

whistler is where its at.

and for biking the west coast is AWESOME.

you can go everywhere
 
i doubt you'll be made fun of for being an american, its not like your in higschool anymore, but vancouver is definetley a nice city, mountains are great in summer and winter. housing is pretty expensive, i dont know about the dorms on the UBC campus, but if your thinking of renting an apartment it will most likely not be cheap
 
I'll try to answer...I'm a second year student at UBC.

The city I think is awesome, I enjoy Vancouver a lot. The bus system is pretty good, it's easy to get around from the UBC campus to the surrounding area to downtown and stuff. Not to mention it's so close to Whistler. The atmosphere I really like, I lived in LA for a year, and the people here are so much nicer and less..."judgy?". The weather I can't really comment on, I'm from Oregon which has almost identical weather, I'm used to the rain, but some people get depressed by it raining a good portion of the winter. The school academically is great, it's ranked high, and so far I've had good professors. In my faculty at least (Science) though, class sizes are big ~100-200 people. I don't know anything about sports, I think UBC sucks at sports, I don't really know though. Parties are always present, it is a college after all, and the 19 year old drinking age is awesome. Tuition isn't that high, but it's not cheap. I think it works out to 19,000 a year, plus cost of living (housing, food, etc). Cost of living is somewhat high...Rent you should expect to pay ~600 a month, give or take. Food and drink is way more expensive than I'm used to here too, a nice restaurant dinner is like 15 bucks, plus tax, and the taxes here are pretty high, 15% on stuff you have to pay full tax on. There isn't enough housing on campus for people to live there for 4 years, but it's very close to residential areas where it doesn't seem to hard to get an apartment or room or something (based on looking around craigslist and the AMS rent site). There are lots of people from the states. There are lots of cool people, and lots of skiers. Though, if you are studying science like I am, be prepared for everyone in your classes to be asian, haha.

Anyways, I realized now that's just one run-on paragraph, but hopefully it helped. PM me if you have more specific questions.
 
i am only a sophmore in high school but this school really intrigues me too i would love to end up there
 
Great reply man, thanks! Yeah from what I hear, it sounds amazing. That green circle that surrounds the campus is so awesome. I am definitely going to apply and if I get in, It will be at the top of my list. So I take it that it rains a lot, but all the mountains get a ton of snow? I guess all west weather is like that? The sea level areas stay mild all year but the mountains get pounded? Also can you surf off Vancouver? And wow, 19 drinking age...so dope haha. Thanks to everyone for the replys!
 
you can't really surf off vancouver, but tofino is relatively close and you can do weekend trips to it. You can actually live on campus all 4 years, specially if your from outside of vancouver, you just need to be smart about your application times and be willing to pay $660 a month for premier housing on campus. I'll post more later...i'm awake for no reason and keeping my gf up. peeeace.
 
that tofino place is so baller. the water is so cold though. but yeah its on vancouver island so you gotta take the ferry first
 
I think tuition actually runs upwards of 20,000 for international students. And depending on what you get into, don't expect it to be easy unless you take 3 course terms.
 
umm yeh ubc is quite nice it has a forest right behind it and shit like that mountain bike trails etc.the campus is awsome but keep in mind it rains ALOT so if ur not into rain not really a great choice.

also a new private university just opened up in squamish. its called quest from what ive heard about its sick campus right on the side of a mountain. definatly worth looking into. squamish is also closer to whistler than vancouver. from ubc i think the drive up to whistler is 2 hours and the drive for squamish the drive is 30 minutes so if u want to ski lots u could probally live in whistler and go to school in squamish which personally i would rather do ( squamis is a bit of a shit hole)

anyways here is quests web sit adress

www.questu.ca
 
I'd def encourage you to apply there.  The campus is in a perfect location and the city is sooo sick.  Skiing, biking, skating, people, girls, food, and green there are all amazing.  The only bad thing is lots of rain and expensive alcohol..but you get over that pretty quick.  The schools also real nice, ive really enjoyed all my classes so far. Def a siiiick place!
 
What do you mean? In what way? Thanks for the info everyone, im really looking forward to getting in, hopefully going there. And for the weed aspect, I don't smoke, but im sure it is good haha. So how expensive is the booze? Say a pint of import at a local bar. Also, will I get screwed with living costs seeing as the us dollar is equal to the canadian currency, however everything is still priced according to the old standard??? Thanks!!! Oh and for the record I got 3 A-'s, an A and a ...........fucking D+ ; ( but that still gives me a 3.29 GPA which should be fine to get in. (once they see the 4 A's they will understand I just messed up in one class)
 
I was actually looking at U of C pretty strongly as a place to go next year. I live in Ontario so I've applied to Queens and Western and then out East I applied to St. FX and Dal so now I'm looking at somewhere to apply out west, I'm definitely going to have to give UBC some stronger consideration, the turnoff for me is that it is a pretty large school, like how big are the class sizes usually? Thats my problem with western too so I just applied to Kings which is one of the smaller colleges there.
 
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vancouver is the 3rd ranked city in the world..of course its nice. tuition shouldnt be upwards of 20000 its more like 10000 and the skiing is great. grouse mountain (a local mountain) has 15 feet of snow right now its rediculous. Im in grade 12 and being able to up to the mountain after school is definately a plus. If you move here, you'll probably never forget it...
 
Hey im pretty sure Im gonna go to ubc...cant wait. gonna apply soon. first order of business, ride A-Line at whistler ; ) Then go legally enjoy a new castle brown ale at a local pub, by bicycle. How are the academics at UBC??? Thanks everyone.
 
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