Ready, Set, Go! Finding your Match and Applying to Ontario Universities

After checking out various undergraduate programs, student services and taken a virtual tour of the campus, you are ready to apply! In Ontario, we have a centralized application system called the Ontario Universities’ Application Centre (OUAC). To apply to any of the Ontario Universities, including The University of Western Ontario (Western), you can simply visit www.ouac.on.ca.

For a base fee of C$140, students are able to apply to a maximum of three programs at one university. Each additional choice is $42, and there is a C$75 document evaluation fee for students who are not applying directly from high school. Some universities will extend alternate offers of admission should you not be admissible to your original program choices. For Western, you must apply to programs and/or faculties of your interests separately.

When should you apply? Applying early and well before the deadline is always best. Although international students may apply to Western as late as May 15th, our programs may fill early. We also recommend that you send supporting documents to Admissions Offices as soon as they are available. Although universities will acknowledge and request documents once your application is received, if supporting documents are available now, they can be submitted and they will be matched to your application when it is received. Here is a helpful admissions link from Western http://www.welcome.uwo.ca/preview/admissions/index.html.

The benefit of applying to Western is that some of our first entry faculties (Arts, Science and Social Science) have a flexible first year where you can explore subject areas and courses that haven’t been available to you previously, while other programs have a fairly prescribed first year program (Engineering, Music). You will be invited to meet one-on-one (or chat on the phone) with a counsellor to help you select your first year courses in the summer prior to your arrival so that you keep your options open and have multiple program pathways from which to choose at the end of your first year. As a result you will have the flexibility to change your major, add a minor/major from another faculty or complete a combined degree. Most importantly, you will be able to study specifically and exactly what you are interested in!

We wish you good luck in finding your perfect match in Ontario!