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How friendly is Mac to older/mature students?

 
Old 04-28-2012 at 12:50 AM   #1
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How friendly is Mac to older/mature students?
By that I mean:

- dealing with transfer credit (programmes seem highly structured & progessive; a good thing, generally, but it's unclear how someone with previous studies might fit into the scheme of doing a general first year & applying to a programme in 2nd).

- course availability and enrolment - most courses seem to be offered during the day & require (as seen in another post) attendance on multiple days; no online offerings - is that right?

It also seems that at least some courses require extra-curricular involvement on campus (e.g., participating in or supporting research). Which, again, is great, and a sign of real investment in students, but possibly difficult for working students with other commitments.

- academic support & other accommodations for working stiffs (e.g., electronic submission of coursework vs hard copy required at 8 am)

- demographics & culture: is there a fair number of older people (30+), or more like maybe 1-2 (or none) in any given class?

Appreciate thoughts from older students as well as traditional ones. Thanks!
Old 04-28-2012 at 01:11 AM   #2
jhan523
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Unregistered View Post
By that I mean:

- dealing with transfer credit (programmes seem highly structured & progessive; a good thing, generally, but it's unclear how someone with previous studies might fit into the scheme of doing a general first year & applying to a programme in 2nd).

- course availability and enrolment - most courses seem to be offered during the day & require (as seen in another post) attendance on multiple days; no online offerings - is that right?

It also seems that at least some courses require extra-curricular involvement on campus (e.g., participating in or supporting research). Which, again, is great, and a sign of real investment in students, but possibly difficult for working students with other commitments.

- academic support & other accommodations for working stiffs (e.g., electronic submission of coursework vs hard copy required at 8 am)

- demographics & culture: is there a fair number of older people (30+), or more like maybe 1-2 (or none) in any given class?

Appreciate thoughts from older students as well as traditional ones. Thanks!
Can't answer all of them but...

1. Transfer Credits: I'm not an admin for any department but as long as the course outline of the course you took matches the course outline of the course you want to transfer the credit over as, are the very similar then you shouldn't have a problem with it.

2. There are no online courses at McMaster. McMaster does have evening classes but if you were to just take evening classes then you would probably have to go part-time as it's highly unlikely for you to enroll in 5 night classes (remember that certain courses are required for your degree and may not all be offered as a nigh class). Although most classes don't have attendance/participation marks in class themselves so you don't actually have to attend. But you would have to learn all the material on your own as almost all classes don't have podcasts.

3. A hard copy is usually always required (No idea why) but you could always talk to your professor if you have prior engagements and cannot hand-in a report at a certain time. Most of the time reports are due in class or tutorial, but you can still talk to your professor about submitting it electronically before a deadline and then handing in the hard copy later that day.

4. It's hard to tell when there are thousands of people in classes first year but I've seen 1-2 people who look like they could be over 30 within my tutorials (which are maybe 20-30 students) in first year. In my program in upper years there were none (my program is ~40-50 students).

I'm a young student by the way.
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Pennsylvania College of Optometry at Salus University Third Year - Doctor of Optometry
Old 04-28-2012 at 01:18 AM   #3
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Wow, didn't expect such a quick reply - thank you for the kind & thorough response!
Old 04-28-2012 at 01:39 AM   #4
jhan523
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Unregistered View Post
Wow, didn't expect such a quick reply - thank you for the kind & thorough response!
MacInsiders is pretty quick at responding. Hopefully some mature students will be able to give you some feedback on their experience.

By the way, some useful information if you are applying as a mature student:
http://registrar.mcmaster.ca /calen...2-13/pg81.html

Also, if you do have any questions which you would like answered by a professional then I think the best place would be the student success centre http://studentsuccess.mcmast er.ca/

They would probably be able to answer your questions related to things like assignment submissions. Things that could impact your university career like that.

Also, I found this on transfer credits: http://registrar.mcmaster.ca /calen...2-13/pg90.html

I also missed one of your points. I haven't encountered any courses which REQUIRE extra-curricular work such as participating in research. I know Psych courses tend to have "bonus" marks for participating in research but it's not actually required (plus they aren't very long to do and you book in advance so you can plan around it). The only course which actually required a lot of commitment was a science based thesis where I had to be in lab a lot of the time. But if your program doesn't require a thesis then that isn't a problem. If it does require a thesis which requires you to be somewhere for long periods of time and often during working hours then that something you'll have to consider (quitting your job in the future or pursuing a degree which doesn't require a thesis).
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Pennsylvania College of Optometry at Salus University Third Year - Doctor of Optometry
Old 04-28-2012 at 01:42 AM   #5
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Oh yeah, and if you are pursuing a field like med-rad, that will definitely take up a big part of your time commitment as you will likely need to practice your lab skills which involve equipment you don't have at home.
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Jeremy Han
McMaster Alumni - Honours Molecular Biology and Genetics
Pennsylvania College of Optometry at Salus University Third Year - Doctor of Optometry
Old 04-28-2012 at 10:13 AM   #6
Kathy2
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Unregistered View Post
By that I mean:

- dealing with transfer credit (programmes seem highly structured & progessive; a good thing, generally, but it's unclear how someone with previous studies might fit into the scheme of doing a general first year & applying to a programme in 2nd).

- course availability and enrolment - most courses seem to be offered during the day & require (as seen in another post) attendance on multiple days; no online offerings - is that right?

It also seems that at least some courses require extra-curricular involvement on campus (e.g., participating in or supporting research). Which, again, is great, and a sign of real investment in students, but possibly difficult for working students with other commitments.

- academic support & other accommodations for working stiffs (e.g., electronic submission of coursework vs hard copy required at 8 am)

- demographics & culture: is there a fair number of older people (30+), or more like maybe 1-2 (or none) in any given class?

Appreciate thoughts from older students as well as traditional ones. Thanks!
I'm not a mature student but my brother is. Hopefully I can help out here!

Transfer credits: I don't know the specifics but you can definitely get some credit for courses you've taken at other schools. It all depends on the department and other college/university though. It's a course-by-course thing, so each will get looked at individually.

Course availability: you're right, there aren't any online courses at Mac. You can take online courses at Athabasca and get the credits transferred to Mac, but those courses tend to be very expensive ($1000+ for one course)

I don't know of many courses that require extra curricular effort. Some projects can involve field research, but that's usually only if there's one big assignment per term, so you don't have to worry too much about that.

Some classes require you to be there 3 days a week, some only require you do be there 1 day a week (tutorials/labs). It depends on the prof and the set up of the course. Some profs put full lecture notes or podcasts online, and it really cuts down on your classtime. There's really no way to know this until you're IN the class though.

There are evening classes. Like jhan said, you could take all evening classes, but you would have to be part time. I could be wrong, but I'm pretty sure that ALL mature students are part time for their first year. So it's definitely possible to take all evening classes. It just depends how the schedule works out.

Academic support: Most profs and TAs are understanding if you're a mature student and have other responsibilities, if you talk to them early enough. If you talk to them the day before a paper is due, they won't be very accommodating.

Demographics: As expected, most students are 18-22 years old, but I've found that there is always at least one mature student in every class. Most students are actually pretty relaxed about this, so don't worry. Just because you're, say, 30 years old and in a first year class, that doesn't mean anything. For all they know, you could be a PhD student filling your schedule with electives. So don't worry about it. Being a mature student also means you might be able to have a closer relationship with your profs and TAs, since you have more in common.
Old 04-29-2012 at 03:24 PM   #7
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Thanks, Jeremy, for more thoughtful suggestions (and links)! All important considerations. (Luckily, I am not now considering med-rad...)

And thank you, Kathy, for your helpful comments, as well

Judging by the number of page views, a lot of people will benefit from both your contributions.

It sounds as though part-time or flexible working arrangements might best support study at McMaster (vs trying to hold a solid 9-5 job)...



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