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[quote=Anonymous]My DD attends McGill and loves it. As a parent, I do too.

Campus wise, McGill reminds me of Middlebury's buildings set onto Georgetown's campus. There are lots of grey stone buildings - some very old, some modern. The campus itself is distinct from the city - one leaves the city and enters the campus (vs GWU or NYU, where the campus is criss-crossed with streets). There is a nice big grassy quad where there are student events. Including a hockey rink during the winter. When we did our first visit, I was not charmed at all by the campus but my daughter immediately thought it was very cool (and still does). It reminds me of that passage in the book Crazy U where the dad and son go look at the dorm building and dad thinks it's depressing, but the kid is over the moon at how awesome it is. I bit my tongue when we first visited b/c at the end of the day, it's our kids that need to like where they are going to be.

My daughter absolutely loves Montreal - especially the funky neighborhoods, like the Plateau and Mile End. And the area down towards Concordia. She is forever discovering new cute cafes to study in. She almost never goes to the commercial center (boring) or the Old Port (touristy). There is always something going on in Montreal - concerts, art installations, festivals, etc.

French language skills are not an issue. My daughter reports that there are many American kids at McGill who never studied French.

McGill is not a team-sports-oriented school. It does have a big state school feel in terms of the bureaucracy. There's no coddling of kids. But a lot of parents (myself included) like that feature, it helps the kids learn to be very independent, navigate the system, and advocate for themselves. "McGill grows them up quick" is one saying I've heard.

The off-campus housing is phenomenal, not a downside at all. Housing is very cheap, and my daughter's current apartment is beautiful. There are tons of students living a stone's throw away, my daughter and her friends get together frequently at each other's apartments for dinners, house parties, etc. The lifestyle is more of that of a young professional than a student. Her first year she lived in the dorm, which helped her make friends.

Even though Canada and the US are similar in many ways, Canada is still a very different country, with different priorities and issues. Living abroad has been educational and enlightening for my daughter. Having said that, "abroad" is a 1 hr 20 min flight from DC. Easy for her to come home, easy for us to visit.

I was worried about the winter but it actually wasn't as bad as I thought it would be. The kids still go out even when it's like 20 below, everyone just gets and wears Montreal-appropriate gear. The North Face jackets we wear in DC don't cut it -- the kids get seriously heavy-duty, hood-to-knees type coats. My advice, don't do a college visit anytime November through March, being dumped into the freezing weather is going to be way too shocking and it will definitely turn you off from the school. Remember, the kids have months to adjust to the increasingly colder weather. They don't go from 50 to 10 degrees overnight.

The student body is diverse and international.

Lastly, the tuition is incredibly reasonable.

The downsides? There's a bit of additional paperwork/hassle to get going - your kid will need to get a Canadian and Quebecian student visa, and also, you'll need to set up a Canadian bank account and convert US dollars to CA dollars. However, there's a very supportive int'l parent community and everyone shares tips on how to manage the US-Canadian issues. Also, the student health care is not the best, so if your kid has underlying health issues that need to be managed, McGill is probably not the best place for them. [/quote]

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