Education

Ranking Canadian universities in 2018 on how they work—and party

Our 2018 ranking of the top schools in Canada for students who enjoy both working hard and partying hard

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Maclean’s surveyed more than 23,384 undergraduate students across Canada in 2017, we asked them how much time they spent hitting the books—and how much time they spent hitting the bars. Using those results, we created a new ranking of schools where they know how to work and party hard.

We calculated the average number of hours students spent studying and partying for each school, using the total reported number of hours a week divided by the number of respondents. In order to find the schools with the best work-party balance, we ranked the average number of hours students spent hitting the books and separately ranked the number of hours they spent partying. Simply tallying up the number of hours between studying and partying would skew the results. So we devised another approach. We assigned a score to each ranking out of 10. Schools where students spent the most time studying received 10 points, while the school with the lowest ranking received zero. We applied the same scoring system to partying. The two scores were added together to form the basis of our ranking.

For the second year in a row, Queen’s University placed at the top of our ranking. Students at that school spend an average of six hours per week in bars, pubs or clubs and 20.2 hours at the library.


School Study hours Party hours
Queen's 20.2 6.0
McGill 21.9 4.1
Western 18.6 4.6
Acadia 17.5 5.0
Sherbrooke 19.0 3.8
Dalhousie 17.7 4.5
Guelph 18.0 4.1
New Brunswick 17.5 4.4
Mount Allison 17.3 4.6
Wilfrid Laurier 16.7 4.9
Waterloo 21.0 2.9
Ottawa 18.7 3.1
McMaster 19.6 3.0
St. Francis Xavier 15.2 7.9
Montréal 19.8 2.8
Laval 19.6 2.9
UNBC 18.2 3.1
Laurentian 16.3 4.0
Victoria 17.1 3.4
Moncton 20.6 2.6
Memorial 16.3 3.9
Nipissing 14.3 4.8
Lakehead 16.9 3.2
Bishop's 13.1 7.0
Alberta 18.2 2.7
UBC 18.5 2.7
Toronto 19.7 2.3
Concordia 16.2 3.4
Carleton 15.7 3.8
Trent 15.8 3.6
Lethbridge 16.3 3.0
Saskatchewan 17.6 2.7
St. Thomas 13.5 4.3
Ryerson 16.4 2.9
Brandon 18.1 2.4
Calgary 17.3 2.7
Brock 14.4 3.2
UOIT 17.4 2.6
Windsor 14.9 3.1
UQAM 13.9 3.1
York 16.8 2.3
Saint Mary's 11.7 3.2
UPEI 14.2 2.8
Manitoba 16.5 1.9
Simon Fraser 16.3 1.8
Cape Breton 10.6 1.8
Regina 13.9 2.3
Winnipeg 13.5 2.3
Mount Saint Vincent 12.8 2.2

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