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2 reviews in English

  • Review from Mark V.

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    • 7 friends
    • 18 reviews

    Toronto, ON

    5.0 star rating
    9/15/2010 1 Check-in Here

    My alma mater so kinda bias that way.  It does have a world class Health Sciences faculty :))) and kick-ass history department.  Where else can u study Russian, Habsburg, Imperial Germany and Imperial Islamic empires under one Humanities roof??? I should have gotten into grad school :(  maybe not cause 'gotten' is not a word, baaaaa!

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  • Review from Randy G.

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    • 40 friends
    • 145 reviews

    Toronto, ON

    4.0 star rating
    12/31/2009 13 Check-ins Here

    (For some time I've wanted to do a review to the tune of a song. In honour of my 100th review, and the place I spent the majority of the last decade, I present "House of Mac Eng Fun", my review of McMaster University, to the tune of House of the Rising Sun, as performed by (and with apologies to) The Animals

    For those not familiar with the song, http://www.youtube.com...)

    There is a school in Hamilton
    They caaaall McMaster, son
    And it's been the home of many a techie
    And god, I know, I'm one

    My fiiirrst year was a big one
    Compleeete with head inj'ry
    The claaases: tough but fun and fair
    'cept Comm 1-S-O-3

    Startin' Seeecond year there's more to see
    It's coooooler, to be blunt
    From theeen on things got specialised,
    Doin' thiiings you'd never thunk

    Oh Mother, tell your children
    They should do what I have done
    Spend your lives learnin' to do stuff
    In the House of Mac Eng Fun

    Well, I made tons of friends while bein' there
    You'll do the same, you'll see
    I'm goin' back to McMaster
    'Cause I can't seem to leave

    Well, there is a school in Hamilton
    They caaaall McMaster, son
    And it's been the home of many a techie
    And god, I know, I'm one

    (Thank you)

    I'll be brief to finish this off: I spent six years here on my Bachelor's degree (legitimately - Engineering and Management program with a year of Internship) and I don't regret a second of being there. Great people, and I learned a ton (obviously). Obviously my viewpoint is that of an Engineering student, but I can share the following good things:
    - The McMaster Engineering Society is a great group of people, no matter what anyone else on campus says
    - The location of the school - the edge of Dundas and Hamilton - is perfect, in my opinion. Being close to a reasonable-sized city there are things to do, but being somewhat isolated you can actually get work done.
    - The neighbourhood - Westdale - is great, even if not all the residents appreciate the presence of the university (that's been there longer than they have)
    - Engineering and Management is a great way to learn about technology and how you'll actually wind up working with it (the business side). It's not a great way to become supremely technical.
    - There's a definite sense of camaraderie amongst students - we work together to make sure everyone learns what they need to. My impression of some other schools from some profs - I'm lookin' at you, Waterloo - is that some students would copy the solutions from the library, then destroy them to have an advantage over other students. Mac is more collaborative than that, which is great.

    A few bad points:
    - The hours of operation of most campus services are not conducive to  true technical education (geekery). The computer labs close at like 9pm most days, and the coffee place - in the TECHNOLOGY BUILDING - closed by 4pm most days! (it's gone now).
    - The libraries are well-known for not having incredibly current literature. The recent reaction seems to be to remove books.
    - The student registration system should be nuked from orbit - it's the only way to be sure. It just. Doesn't. Work.
    - The bookstores seldom can keep up with the first-week traffic, but that's probably endemic to all other University campuses.
    - Food Services doesn't take credit cards or Interac, just cash and their own cards. BS.

    Come to think of it, most of my problems with McMaster are also probably going to be repeated at campus after campus across the country. For me, it's a great community of students (and profs, I guess) working together to learn something cool.

    (I apologize for this review being a bit disjointed - I just had too good a time over the years to pick out a few things that I loved)

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