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Queen's University

Canada Canada

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THE World Ranking: 251

Overview

Overview

Queen’s University in Kingston, Ontario is a great university for students who want to study in Canada and enjoy all the best things that Canadian culture has to offer. Canada is a friendly place, and there’s nowhere friendlier than Queen’s University and the happy city of Kingston. The area is beautiful. The facilities are modern. The lecturers are award-winning and dedicated to their work.

 

Queen’s University has been a hub of research and ideas for 175 years, and students and staff at the institution are still making a difference in the 2020s across all programmes and courses. First established in 1834, Queen’s is now one of the country’s leading research-intensive institutions. The university is proud to focus on innovation, discovery, and new knowledge.

 

It’s one of the best Canadian research universities, coming third in the rankings for research awards per faculty against Canada’s competition. It’s also ranked first in Canada for research income growth in the medical category. Queen’s University’s successes show just how much the institution and all of its staff members care about progress, community and learning.

 

Of the 24,000-plus students enrolled at Queens, more than 4,000 are international, making up 11 per cent of the undergraduate community and 27 per cent of the graduate community. China, India, and the USA are the three most common countries that international students at Queen’s come from, but over 100 countries are represented in total.

 

This University cares about the success and wellbeing of every student it admits. There are lots of helpful student support services and educational and recreational facilities, and a high standard of teaching is always maintained — as well as an inclusive, open approach to teaching. Students at Queen’s who want to be prepared for work and taught to a very high standard are in the right place.

 

Explore more about studying at Queen's:

 

Teaching quality

Entry requirements

Scholarships & funding

University structure

Facilities

Student support

Graduate outcomes

 

Teaching Quality

Anyone thinking about studying at Queen’s University can be confident about the teaching quality, as the university stands at 14th on the Times Higher Education rankings in Canada. Learning, study and curiosity are encouraged at Queen’s, and the university wants to create an atmosphere that lets students across disciplines work together to produce the best work possible.

 

Queen’s is home to around 24,000 students in total and over 9,000 members of staff. There are then almost 4,000 academic staff members. This means there are approximately six students to each faculty member, so no student gets forgotten, and every person enrolled at Queen’s University has the right amount of attention and focus. Care and correct class sizes are two of the biggest factors in making sure that quality teaching is always the standard.

 

Queen’s is part of the U15 group. This is a group of Canada’s most research-intensive institutions, and Queen’s University’s membership tells any potential future student that they’ll be able to do all the research and discovery they want to if they apply.

 

The tutors, lecturers and teachers at Queen’s are highly qualified. Most have published academic works and are educated to PhD level. Many faculty members have also won awards, including the Order of Canada. Professor Emeritus Arthur McDonald has even won a Nobel Prize and a Breakthrough Award in Fundamental Physics. With high achievers like these leading the charge at Queen’s, students are in safe hands, and high-quality teaching is to be expected.

 

Students who might want to study at Queen’s University and move to the special city of Kingston can be sure that the standards for learning and teaching are really high — they can see it in strong postgraduate outcomes and high levels of student satisfaction.

 

Entry Requirements

Entry requirements at Queen’s University are specific to the course an applicant has chosen to apply for. Some general university entry requirements like education to the appropriate level (high school or equivalent for undergraduates and previous university qualifications for postgraduates) will need to be met though.

 

Queen’s University’s admission requirements section can help students (international student in particular) find their exact requirements. They can input their chosen programme and their home country or a particular curriculum, and the website will provide them with all the information they need on what qualifications and supporting documents are requirements for admission.

 

During the application process, hopeful future students will get a unique to-do list that lets them know everything they need to do to complete the application and progress to the next stage — waiting to hear if an application has been successful.

 

English Score Required

A certain degree of proficiency in the English language is needed to study at Queen’s since classes are taught in English and assignments are submitted in English. Students will need to confirm their English score if they haven’t:

 

  • Completed an IB diploma
  • Lived in a country where English is the primary language for the three most recent years before study
  • Attended an educational institution full-time, where English is the medium of instruction, for the three most recent years before study

 

For international students who don’t benefit from these exceptions, there are lots of ways to test their English abilities. Many options are accepted by Queen’s, and the full list is available on the university’s website. Two of the most common options are the IELTS and the TOEFL.

 

Students will need an IELTS overall band score of at least 6.5, with no individual bands below 6.0. The IELTS Indicator test isn’t accepted as valid evidence. Alternatively, students will need a TOEFL score of at least 88 overall (24 Writing, 22 Speaking, 22 Reading, 20 Listening).

 

Admission

The process of admission (or rejection) begins when an applicant chooses the programme of study they’d like to be enrolled on and starts their online application. Applications for first-year undergraduate programmes open in early October, the year before student admission. Canadian and international high school students can apply for university admission online at the Ontario Universities’ Application Centre (OUAC) if they want to apply to multiple Ontario institutions at once.

 

The university encourages potential future students to add ‘@queensu.ca’ as a safe sender to make sure all email communications are received, as this is how important communications like requests for more information or application decisions will come to them.

 

When an application is complete and all the necessary supporting documents have been added (like high school transcripts), Queen’s will confirm that it has received the application and let students know how to get a Queen’s NetID. They’ll need this NetID to sign into the SOLUS Student Centre, and they’ll find all the information they need about their application status in this centre, including any outstanding documents needed and all the important due dates and deadlines.

 

Full details on submitting documents can be found on the university’s website, as can a detailed list of the tuition fees that international undergraduates and postgraduates can expect to pay depending on their chosen area of study.

 

Every application is reviewed by the Queen’s University admission team, and by the end of May, a decision should have been made. All applicants should have been notified through the SOLUS Student Centre whether their application has been successful. If accepted, students will then need to confirm Queen’s University’s offer of enrolment and pay their tuition fees for the next term.

 

Scholarships & Funding

Queen’s University makes a lot of effort to keep fees low for students without cutting quality. For students who need some extra help with funding though, there are still lots of opportunities for scholarships, bursaries, and other forms of financial aid.

 

The range of university scholarships available at Queen’s exists to reward students (domestic and international) for their academic excellence when they apply. The university feels that these scholarships encourage hard work and are motivating, but other factors beyond academic success are also considered — factors like communication, leadership, and community involvement.

 

One scholarship example is the Principal’s Scholarship, an automatic admission scholarship (it doesn’t require a separate application) awarded to students with a 95 per cent or higher high school grade average. This scholarship is CAD 4,000, valid for a year and it can’t be renewed. There’s also the Excellence Scholarship, CAD 1,000 for one year only, awarded to students with a high school grade average of 90 to 94.9 per cent.

 

There are several options available to international students in particular, from awards given to specific student groups to programmes running in a student’s home country that could get them some money off their tuition fees.

 

University Structure

There are eight different faculties and schools that the university is organised into. These are:

 

  • The Faculty of Arts and Science
  • The Faculty of Education
  • The Faculty of Engineering and Applied Science
  • The Faculty of Health Sciences
  • The Faculty of Law
  • The School of Graduate Studies and Postdoctoral Affairs
  • The School of Policy Studies
  • The Smith School of Business

 

There’s also the Queen’s School of English, which is an English language preparation course that’s taken before enrolment to bring English scores up to the right level. It’s a brilliant option for international students who really want to attend Queen’s University and study in Canada but aren’t fully confident in their English yet.

 

There are thousands of degree choices for prospective students to choose from at Queen’s, with the Faculty of Arts and Science alone offering over 2,600 different degree options. The choices available make it easy for students to tailor their experience and work towards the career that they want to pursue, but they also mean it’s really important for interested potential students to do lots of research and choose the course that really feels right for them.

 

Every Queen’s degree is unique because there are so many opportunities to customise the degree to suit a student’s career aspirations, personal needs and overall academic interests. Every degree is made from lots of knowledge and lots of quality teaching, but no two degrees are the same.

 

Facilities

Queen’s University is an exciting student activity centre with great learning facilities, welcoming dining halls and plenty of areas for students to socialise and study. There are eight libraries across Queen’s University’s facilities, and in these libraries, there are millions of learning and research materials for students, as well as computers, individual study booths and group study rooms.

 

The Queen’s lecture theatres are carefully built to meet student needs. There are lots of smaller teaching rooms for collaborative work. There’s a remarkable concert hall and studio theatre for arts students in the Isabel.

 

Some of the most impressive academic facilities of all at Queen’s are its modern laboratories, which cover over 5,000 square metres in Chernoff Hall. Plus, Queen’s has a huge number of amazing research centres. Overall, there are 24 institutional and faculty-based research centres and institutes that support interdisciplinary networks:

 

  • The Arthur B. McDonald Canadian Astroparticle Physics Institute
  • The Beaty Water Research Centre
  • The Canadian Institute for Military & Veteran Health Research
  • The Cancer Research Institute
  • The Centre for Advanced Computing
  • The Centre for Energy and Power Electronics Research (ePower)
  • The Centre for Health Innovation
  • The Centre for International and Defence Policy
  • The Centre for Law in the Contemporary Workplace
  • The Centre for Neuroscience Studies
  • The Centre for Studies in Primary Care
  • The Centre for the Study of Democracy and Diversity
  • The GeoEngineering Centre
  • The Health Services and Policy Research Institute
  • The Industrial Relations Centre
  • The Ingenuity Labs Research Institute
  • The Institute for Sustainable Finance
  • The Institute of Intergovernmental Relations
  • The International Centre for the Advancement of Community Based Rehabilitation
  • The John Deutsch Institute for the Study of Economic Policy
  • The Queen's Institute for Energy and Environmental Policy
  • The Scotiabank Centre for Customer Analytics
  • The Surveillance Studies Centre
  • The Translational Institute of Medicine (TIME)

 

The university is proud of each and every one of these research centres and institutes. Queen’s loves that they are collaborative, focused on the future and always trying new things. Any student who also has these important qualities would love the structure, teaching and experience of a learning journey at Queen’s College.

 

Life on campus features everything from student recreation centres with gyms, swimming pools, tennis courts, basketball courts and more to student life centres with restaurants, cafes, shops, and stores. Queen’s facilities are hard to beat, and there are even exciting name brands like Starbucks and Tim Hortons on campus. 80 per cent of students are active, and 100 per cent of students have plenty to do at Queen’s University.

 

Accommodation

Living in student accommodation at Queen’s is a great opportunity to get involved in the university community and make new friends. All residences, whether on-campus or off-campus, are within a 20-minute walking distance of classes. At Queen’s, the community is close, and everything students need is nearby — including university accommodation.

 

There are 17 campus accommodation buildings and a few different student housing options, including six total room types:

 

  • A single room for one resident with a communal, private or single-user private washroom
  • A single room with a bathroom that’s shared with one other room (the person in that room will be of the same gender)
  • A double room shared by two residents of the same gender, with a communal or single-user private washroom
  • A loft double room with bunk beds shared by two residents of the same gender, with a communal or single-user private washroom
  • A triple room shared by three residents of the same gender, with a communal or single-user private washroom
  • A quad room shared by four residents of the same gender, with a communal or single-user private washroom

 

More than 4,500 undergraduate and postgraduate students stay in these buildings, and details of all of the buildings are available to check out on the Queen’s website.

 

To give an example, Victoria Hall is the largest residence at Queen’s, with room for over 800 students. Shaped like a large X, this Hall has five wings and is close to two dining halls. There are cafe and lounge areas available on-site for socialising and eating, as well as other common recreation areas with foosball tables, games and pool tables. The bedrooms come complete with an adjustable bed, desk and chair, as well as a closet and some drawer space.

 

There are also off-campus accommodation options and shared student house situations in the beautiful city of Kingston. These are more common for students in the second year and beyond, while first-year students tend to live on campus.

 

Student Support

Queen’s University understands the importance of student wellbeing. There are lots of student support services across campus that can help with mental health issues, academic concerns, financial issues and more. Queen’s student services and student guides aim to make every student as happy at the university (and in their life) as they can be.

 

Appointments at the Queen’s Student Wellness Service can offer physical and mental health help for a range of concerns. There are also lots of wellness tools, workbooks, and online student support materials available through the service for those who need them.

 

There are several financial aid options and people to talk to about hardships, and there’s a full academic student support programme covering everything from study skills to note-taking too. International students have a range of unique services and supports, especially when they’re settling in and getting used to life in Canada.

 

Graduate Outcomes

Queen’s University works hard to give its students the best tools and skills for the future from day one of their enrolment, and this is one of the main reasons why graduate outcomes from Queen’s are so strong, and students enjoy such good job prospects after leaving the university.

 

There are lots of career services and employment services available to Queen’s students, like appointments with a career guide to discuss next steps and career options, interview technique workshops, drop-in advice time slots, alumni interviews and networking events. The university does all it can to help students stand out to employers in Kingston and Canada and across the globe.

 

For competitively paid work experience that increases employability, students should look into the Queen’s Undergraduate Internship Programme (QUIP). This programme offers paid work experience to second and third-year students that is relevant to their subject, and it’s an opportunity that’s also open to international students (like most of the opportunities at Queen’s, an inclusive and welcoming institution).

 

A staggering 91 per cent of Queen’s graduates are employed just two years after graduating. An incredibly impressive 94 per cent of engineering alumni are employed within this length of time. Students at Queen’s are given the best chance to succeed that they could hope for.

 

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Key facts and figures at Queen's University

Rankings

Times Higher Education World University Rankings 2024
Source: THE

251

OVERALL SCORE

53.1%

TEACHING

37.5%

INTERNATIONAL OUTLOOK

76%

INDUSTRY INCOME

94%

RESEARCH

38%

CITATIONS

72.3%
QS World University Rankings 2025
Source: QS

193

Academic Ranking of World Universities 2024
Source: ARWU

201

Student life in numbers

COSTS PER YEAR
LIVING COSTS

CAD$11,000

AVERAGE PRIVATE RENT

CAD$5,250

AVERAGE TUITION FEE PER YEAR

UNDERGRADUATE

CAD$29,621

POSTGRADUATE

CAD$16,610

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image Saida, Tajikistan

It is very important

Mostly i like practical lessons not theoretical i am very interested in travelling and exploring new things and sharing with my experience with a society.
Even our university has a name  of the highest education place it experiences luck of well qualified  teachers what we see here .

Mostly i like practical lessons not theoretical i am very interested in travelling and exploring new things and sharing with my experience with a society. Even our university has a name of the highest education place it experiences luck of well qualified teachers what we see here .

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