phwoar!

[Jer]

James, Ash, Morgan, Matt, Bill, Kate, Alex, Ben, Gareth, Andy, Pat, Allen and I (and if I'm forgetting somebody I'm sorry--it's late and I'm tired) all went to Oak Bay.

[Graham]

Mostly in different grad years, oddly enough.
I think there's a five-year spread from Pat to Ash in fact.

Kate, of course, is still attending. Because she's 15.

15.

-G

[Rhynome]

Hmm, when reading this thread does anyone else get the impression that Kate might be 15?

[AmazingPjotrMan]

No, more like 19.

[Rhynome]

Yeah, thought as much... can't be 15.

Actually, by the time we're done with this she might be 16.

[Kathleen]

I went to PGSS.

[Rhynome]

Quick question, what's the education system like in Canada? What sort of exams do you have to take and what ages, etc. Who decides what subjects you learn/ take?

And, uhm, so on.

[AmazingPjotrMan]

I'm curious too.

[DP]

When we're 13 we have to kill a polar bear with our own hands, otherwise we will be forever ostracized by the community.

[Rhynome]

Wow, all I had to do was memorise a five minute series of sounds with shapes to prompt me.

Ok it was Hebrew but I'd be fucked if I knew what Hebrew actually means, to me it's just a series of sounds with shapes to prompt. 'Hmm, the funny little x like thing is an a... ah yes, A'haron.'

[AmazingPjotrMan]

Here in Sweden we just have to find a wounded wolf and nurse it back to health. Mostly we end up hurting it and then have the vets fix them.

[Graham]

Quick question, what's the education system like in Canada?

Right.
Here's how it went for me:

Age 6, start kindergarden. In elementary level school you start in kindergarden, move to grade 1 and then through to grade 7.

Elemetary school in BC has English and "French Immersion" streams (because it's our second national language, not that anyone in BC speaks it).

You get one classroom, one teacher, each year, and they teach you all the subjects. Science, Math, Social Studies etc. French is taught mandatorily starting in grade 4.

In grade 8 you start high school and then you get a schedule, each class with a different teacher. And you can choose other lanuages than French.
In grade 11, Science becomes Biology, Physics or Chemistry, and Social Studies becomes History or Geography.

Graduation requirements from Grade 12 in BC are as follows:
Grade 11 level of a language (optional, only needed to get into certain universities)
Grade 11 level Math.
Grade 12 level English.

and three Provincially Examinable subjects, such as grade 12 level Physics, Biology, Chemistry, History, Geography etc.

and a certain number of various credits in electives, dependant on your high school, and the subjects they offer.

I hope that answered it.

-G

[ontarianfrog]

About the same as in Ontario and New-Brunswick. Except that high school starts in grade 9.

Can't tell you exactly the qualifications to get your grade 12 diploma, since the education system changed since I was there.

But it's mostly like in BC for most provinces except for the province of Quebec, where they graduate in grade 11, and then can go to college, or if they want to attend university, they need 2 years in cégep (you can call it pre-university courses.)

[duckie]

except now they have changed all the grad requirements, so we have to take provintial exams in grade 10, 11 and 12 and do a portfolio.
This meens i have 3 provintals this year, 2 of which are in this semester (oh so scary!)
this is in B.C by the way
and they also made it so that high school starts in grade 9 (oh those silly little grade nines being a whol one year younger)

[JesterJ.]

Elementary school: Kindergarden-5
Middle School: 6-8
High School: 9-12.

[Johnny_Lunchbox]

In Ontario, when I was a young'un, we had grade 13. We called it "OAC", which stood for "Ontarians Are Smarter". You needed grade 13 for University (which deals with academic subjects, and trains you for research, development, theory, etc), but only grade 12 for College (which is more for trades--business management, cooking, network admin junk, etc).

So I graduated and left at grade 12, took a year of college, decided I wanted to go to University for English, and so returned to high school for half a year to get my OACs.

Yeah, that's right. I f'n went back. I was only a year older than the smart kids, and still a year or two younger than the stupid kids, so it wasn't that big a deal in retrospect. But I still went to secondary after post-secondary, which is very, very strange.

I also went to French Immersion. Throughout public school, I had one French teacher for every subject except for English (which we didn't even get 'til grade 4), Music, Phys Ed (if we were lucky--they seemed to pick names out of a hat over who taught our phys ed class) and Shop/Home Ec. (And we didn't get Music, Shop, or Home Ec until grade 8.) All the rest was taught in French.

So, I learned math in a language where they use commas instead of decimals and spaces instead of commas.

Which is a very fitting excuse for being mathematically retarded that I don't use nearly often enough.

[miakosummin]

I cant really add anything to the information, excpet I go to Reynolds.

Hmm, 15 years and Oak Bay?I have a friend whos 15 and in oak bay, I just cant remember who it was.... oh, this is going to bother me to no end...

[ontarianfrog]

In Ontario, when I was a young'un, we had grade 13. We called it "OAC", which stood for "Ontarians Are Smarter". You needed grade 13 for University (which deals with academic subjects, and trains you for research, development, theory, etc), but only grade 12 for College (which is more for trades--business management, cooking, network admin junk, etc).

Yep I was in the last year they had OACs. I have to say that it really helped in Moncton University, two of my math classes were basically my calculus and algebra classes in high school.

So, I learned math in a language where they use commas instead of decimals and spaces instead of commas.

Like that was as hard as French syntax and grammar! (which you prolly don't remember by now anyway)

[Under13]

Things that I have learned in this thread:

- It's okay to acknowledge that Kate is "a looker."
- "Squiddy" is Kate. Not Sean Howard.
- Canadian public education is organized rather similarly to US public education, the largest notable difference being optional French for US children.
- In Ontario, it is okay to use the letter C in an acronym to stand for a word that starts with S.

These are all things that I have learned.



Also - Kate and Ash, although attractive, also both look like the kinds of girls that would kick your ass for making a pass at them.

[Rhynome]

Well maybe some of us are in to that sort of thing.

[Graham]

Also - Kate and Ash, although attractive, also both look like the kinds of girls that would kick your ass for making a pass at them.

True. For the record, Kathleen will also kick some ass. And has. It was awesome.

-G

[Morgan]

ash is getting less violent in her old age.

[Under13]

ash is getting less violent in her old age.

Ripping the heads off of kittens with her teeth starts to lose its appeal after a while, I guess.

[AmazingPjotrMan]

Not really, have you done so lately?

[Johnny_Lunchbox]

Things that I have learned in this thread:

- In Ontario, it is okay to use the letter C in an acronym to stand for a word that starts with S.

Only if you're really, really smart, though.

Which nobody is anymore (well, nobody younger than frog, anyways), because we don't have OACs anymore.