lookingaround

Assuming you took a disclosed test: use the documents to identify your problem sections and questions that you had on the day. It may not have been the ones you expected. Prepare - get all the official 10 question books you can, and use them. Force yourself to review the questions afterwards, not just reading and going 'ohhh, right' but explaining the logic. Drill the sections in half an hour not 35 minutes. This will simulate more test anxiety in practice (which you'll have on the day for different reasons), and if you get used to only having half an hour that gives a 15% buffer on the day for a question to go badly, or just generally slow down.

You know, the admissions websites of schools you're interested in contain the answer to questions like this, and are quicker (and potentially more accurate). https://www.law.utoronto.ca/admissions/jd-admissions/admissions-frequently-asked-questions

? I was surprised at that claim, so I actually timed it; it took just under 5 minutes to find the precise GPA calculations on the university websites for the first 7 Canadian law schools I could think of (ranging geographically from the west coast to Toronto). If you want to attend law school, basic research skills are your friend. Examples from the websites (schools removed to encourage your searching, as you apparently missed these while reading "every university's individual site"): "if applicants have a four year degree (60 units/120 credits), we eliminate the 9 worst units (18 credits) from the GPA calculation. It does not matter when the worst grades were achieved", "take into account all undergraduate grades ... We do not drop lowest grades, nor do we look only at the best two years", ""The admission GPA is calculated on undergraduate courses only, using the best three academic years", ""The Admissions Committee looks at your best two (2) full years undergraduate GPA".

The 'no hats' rule btw is firm. as in, I've seen clerks wait until the Judge was pausing for breath, and then bark "hats off in the gallery!" while looking directly at the offender.

I don't have much to add to the thoughts and concerns about studying in the US beyond what people have already said. I will note that before you add any detail or comments (particularly about values and reasons) that you appear to be using a real name as your forum username? Posts on this forum are un-editable (after 1 hour), and undeleteable, which you may wish to bear in mind before posting personal information under your identifiable name.

You should aim for 180; there's no point trying to leave points on the table. What kind of LSAT would make you competitive depends on the school you're applying to. Some want cGPA. Some want the two most recent years. Some want the best two years. Some will drop the worst credits wherever they are in your transcript. The last of those is pretty much best for everyone, the rest can dramatically change what your GPA is calculated at. For what it's worth, 3.4 is a GPA with which a lot of people can get into law schools. It might not be their first preferences, but you asked about 'any'. Get an LSAT in the mid 160s and depending on where your GPA falls out in various calculations, and how serious you are about 'any' you may be competitive at a number of schools. The above is only applicable to numbers schools, as schools which place emphasis on background, references, etc are always something more of a crapshoot. I mean, they're not going out of their way to find low numbers, but starting a non-profit that ships food and christmas gifts to remote northern communities down ice roads might make a difference at, say, Lakehead, when it couldn't at eg Manitoba (who make decisions with no personal statement, references, or any other information beyond applicants' statistics). I mean, there's 16(?) schools in English-speaking Canada. If you're thinking about applying to foreign universities, it would take far less time than that to decide if there are any you are/aren't prepared to attend, and pull their publicity info on how they calculate GPA, and how they weigh it.

If you plan on practicing in Canada, TRU (or any Canadian school) beats a third tier private US school. Coming back you'd have to go through the NCA process to even be eligible to practice in Canada. The cost of attendance would be enormous (https://law.seattleu.edu/office-and-administration/student-financial-services/tuition-and-fees) - US$72,000/year from their own figures ($93k Canadian) - each year there is going to cost about the same as an entire degree at many Canadian schools. The name isn't going to impress people (the coming-back sequence and cost of attendance is arguable for world class universities like Yale or Oxford. BTW even some fantastic university names don't travel that well - I met a Judge this year who went to Pantheon-Assas. Clearly it didn't do them any harm (they're a Judge) but when I remarked on my being impressed by that, they said "Yeah, one of the best universities in the world and nobody here's heard of it". On the one hand, 'went to a barely ranked school' is less important in Canada which doesn't rank schools and treats most US schools interchangeably as 'foreign', on the other hand you'd be diving into the bottom half of one of the most stratified legal markets in the world, where they really do care about it, and there's a much better ranked one (like, 100 places higher) in the same city. If you're just starting to think about this, you have time to think, but that looks like a whole lot of downside.

More than anything, that looks like a ranking of who needs to borrow the most money to go to law school. Toronto and Osgoode have highest tuition, UBC has Vancouver cost of living, McGill has extra year of not working.

I was recently talking with an acquaintance and loved just how quickly the conversation moved from Them: "You got into law school, that's fantastic, that's amazing... what are you going to do, like what kind of law are you going to work in?" Me: "Well, I've enjoyed going to court and watching the criminal cases, and I found the classes in that really interesting." Them: "Oh wow. I couldn't work for criminals. Would you really be ok with that?" Me: "[sigh]"

I don't think any Canadian school publishes that - there's definitely not a central point that lists every school. It's not like the US where transferring (and ranking generally) is a bigger deal, & each school publishes an annual report on it.

It is both worth it and unnecessary. You can do just fine on the LSAT practicing on tests in the 50s - basic logic and reasoning hasn't changed in the last few years. I can't remember when the new style RC appeared (compare two passages) so you might not be getting to practice on that, and the newer LRs tend to be more subtle, so the newer tests certainly contain more directly relevant things to practice on - but you won't encounter a whole different section type or something if you've practiced on older ones.

Whatever the reason, a decision has been made by Robson that students self-enroll. With that decision made, it has to be done within the general enrollment system - which means selecting the individual courses. There's no ability in the system to just select 'section1' or 'section2' - you choose that yourself, then type in the numbers that relate to that section. Systems and Methods are taught/split differently (Systems is lectures with everyone, Methods is... different - combination of your section/everyone/French), so everyone has the same numbers for those. For the others (Const, Torts, Property, Contracts, Crim), you select eg 1,2,3,4,5 for section 1, 6,7,8,9,10, for section 2, 11,12,13,14,15 for section 3. Think of it as a really straightforward LSAT game: if Amy and John want section 1 and Matt wants not to be in the same section as Amy, A+J have to select 1-5, M can select either 6-10 or 11-15. Nobody can select anything else. (In reality the numbers are longer - but the point is you pick a block and stick to it, except for the two classes everyone does as a year group).

Yes, but beyond "I want to be in Canada long-term", do you have a plan for that? Do you have a plan for how to pay international tuition fees (to qualify for a study permit)? Do you have a plan for how to become a Permanent Resident? This may be tied to if/where you decide you want to go to school - some Provinces might sponsor graduates of their universities, whereas others wouldn't. There's little point in doing a law degree somewhere if you do not know starting it if and how you can qualify to stay there (with some exceptions - even if a person couldn't stay in eg England or the US, it's often a good idea to go to Yale, or Oxford if the chance arises). Canada doesn't really have "regional prestigious schools" in the same way the US does. Several Provinces only have a single school (some have none). As a general rule, it's less difficult to find work where you went to school, where you can more easily meet local practitioners, where your professors have connections and their names are known. Before you get excited about the idea of "maybe there are jobs in places people don't want to go", try sitting in a domestic freezer for a few hours, then remember much of Canada is twice as cold as that for half the year.

I'd be surprised if they go up by much - international fees at McGill are already comparable to the rest of Canada (compare to their v low tuition for especially Quebec residents). 2015, total fees for international were $37,000 a year, by 2018 this was up to $42,300. OK, they're 9k below Toronto (but who isn't) but they're in no way a cheap outlier on foreign student fees. *shrug* we'll see.

You may (or may not) be eligible for scholarships. You also may find that bursaries (fee-reductions) have requirements like "Must have applied for student aid from home province" - you won't have one, and so might not be eligible to apply. In addition, international fees can be incredibly expensive. As an example of a cheaper city (for cost of living), Robson Hall in Winnipeg charge $10,300 a year for domestic students, but $25,300 for international students. That's nearly three times the price. Saskatchewan is $13,600/year for domestic students, but $37,200/year for international. Toronto is one of the most expensive to both live in, and pay tuition - $36,700 for domestic students, $51,400/annually for international students. They claim that as a consequence of that expense, they have the most generous student aid program of Canadian law schools, but the most relevant line for you (and indicative of why just 'the most generous law school' is at best a problematic question) is "Students who are not Canadian citizens or do not hold Canadian permanent residency status, and who enroll in the J.D. Program are not eligible to apply for the Faculty’s Financial Aid Program" (https://www.law.utoronto.ca/utfl_file/count/media/front_end_booklet_2018-2019_version2.0.pdf). The frivolous answers to your questions are (1) Maybe (2) One that says you can't use their generosity (3) Cities that people don't want to live in. But they're not really fair. It looks like what you're trying to get at is 'Where's the most financially viable place to do a 3 year degree?'. And that's a harder one all told. The unfortunate reality is that cheaper cities are typically cheaper because they're less desirable. Whether it's due to climate, or job potential, or location, there isn't unmatched demand pushing up prices. You'd need to think about whether you want to spend three years (and potentially the rest of your life) in eg Winnipeg, or Saskatoon, or Fredericton, or whether the increased cost of eg Vancouver, Victoria, Toronto would be worth it for the quality of life/job potential/access to other things. As an international student, any Canadian law school is likely to be horrifically expensive (McGill: $9,600 for non-Quebecois Canadians, $4,400 for Quebecois, and $42,300 for international), and you'd need to be able to prove you could pay your fees and living costs at the time you apply for a study permit (even if you do then qualify for a reduction in the fees on merit or need somehow). The study permit brings up another issue: Would you have a plan for how to stay long-term, and use that very expensive degree?