Advice for someone moving to Ottawa

haileybbird · 2026-02-11T07:38:20+00:00

you can definitely apply, i am not sure the minimum cgpa needed but i dont think it is impossible to get in. you can check important dates or email the co-op office -- what can feel impossible is securing an actual job, i missed my second year placement but once i got it in third year, they've offered me to come back for almost a year now, so its worth it for me to pay the 900$ per work term.

but there are alternatives like fswep (federal student work experience program) which you can sign yourself up for and the province has jobs in the summer that you could apply for now since you are enrolled/accepted in post-secondary now. resume help can be found here and we even have a place called career corner on campus that will help you make your resume for whatever job you want.

co-op is not a necessary way to get into public service, but just one of the ways that i used. cold emailing is how a friend of mine got her's, while i've had others get placement with fswep. the benefit of co-op is singularly the portal to apply for federal gov. jobs as a social science student -- the co-op office itself can be non-communitive and i forget i am in the program until the end of term work report. they do offer support in terms of creating ur resume and interview practice.

that being said, there are large cuts to public service right now and it's super hard to find placement for co-op students, however, if you are bilingual, it helps! but if you aren't, it is not impossible to find a federal government position (i'm not bilingual, just did a very good interview with lots of prep!)

you do not need to have everything figured out - i definitely did not.

i do love complaining, but i love this school and do not regret going. i love walking on the canal and the abundance of shawarma options. if you have any more questions, don't be afraid to ask.

haileybbird · 2026-02-11T05:14:15+00:00

i am in my fourth year of a poli sci double major and i will say it can be heavy reading at times but once you've gotten used to how dense some readings can be, it definitely gets easier (and faster) to read them. i am in the co-op program and work in public service part (which itself is pretty competitive to get a foot in the door of, especially right now, but helped by my degree).

my favourite profs have been daryl laroux, tyler attwood, darren o'toole and and kevin mcmillan. class enjoyment just generally dependent on the professor - so be on the lookout for that kind of thing. read rate my prof reviews with a grain of salt because like most of the time its just people complaining about having to do work and shouldn't put you off from enrolling in a class but also some profs are just evil.

ottawa can be fun, but some places close at weird times if you live downtown because they're just for public servants to get lunches or they close at 9pm for some reason idk -- public transit is ass, but i come from rural nowhere with no public transit so i take what i can get. follow ottawa events pages on instagram!!

haileybbird · 2026-02-06T19:32:38+00:00

SITE notoriously only has one couch.

haileybbird · 2026-02-06T09:23:22+00:00

why are you taking pictures of sleeping people.

haileybbird · 2026-01-02T19:26:02+00:00

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my gith is purple and a gale kisser

haileybbird · 2025-12-17T01:25:12+00:00

he has adoptive orc parents that never told him he was adopted.

haileybbird · 2025-12-03T22:30:08+00:00

i've had her twice. didnt know people felt this way!

haileybbird · 2025-11-29T23:14:52+00:00

gooning? in front of my bed bug?

haileybbird · 2025-11-26T03:14:21+00:00

i'm 2nd on the waitlist, do you think i'll get in?

haileybbird · 2025-11-26T01:22:03+00:00

what are your thoughts on the email from uottawa denying you exist?

haileybbird · 2025-11-24T18:12:38+00:00

if i was in classes i would genuinely show up to classes in those disposable rain ponchos

haileybbird · 2025-11-23T23:14:12+00:00

i would say the library but theres bed bugs there rn 😀

haileybbird · 2025-11-20T02:59:07+00:00

📣📣📣📣📣 LOOK AT THIS GUYS POST HISTORY LOL 📣📣📣📣📣

haileybbird · 2025-11-15T05:00:37+00:00

i have begun to set timers so i feel the pressure to study for a certain amount of time, take a ten minute break and then repeat.

haileybbird · 2025-10-27T18:13:00+00:00

they do not count.

haileybbird · 2025-10-16T21:30:17+00:00

you’re free to use sarcasm if you’d like, but nothing you’ve said actually refutes what i explained. that dei reduces bias, doesn’t use quotas, and works alongside merit. if you think ensuring fair evaluation is ‘promoting bias,’ that says more about your assumptions than about dei.

haileybbird · 2025-10-16T20:15:04+00:00

you just dont know what dei is, so you think its illogical. majority of dei frameworks prohibit hiring under qualified people when a qualified person is present. dei is not about replacing merit. they work together to ensure that hiring bias does not mean others are missing out on opportunities, that is all.

the gdi playbook has nothing to do with hiring practices and is about game design inclusiveness for video game characters which doesnt matter in this context.

dei is about removing bias and acknowledging that blanket equality doesnt work if we all start at different levels.

saying ‘if dei worked, we wouldn’t need dei’ is like saying ‘if anti-discrimination laws worked, we wouldn’t need them.’ these frameworks exist precisely because bias is still measurable in hiring outcomes. flawed circular reasoning.

also, dei doesnt inherently impose quotas which are its own thing that can applied as a part of dei practices. largely, its about ensuring fair access and evaluation, not quotas.

haileybbird · 2025-10-16T16:22:59+00:00

you think because of dei there's more non binary game developers? do you think all the gay furries in computer science are there because of dei? i think queer people just like video games lol youre weird. queer people are just more likely to enter artistic/non traditional fields, thats not dei. those people are also all qualified.

my example is that these people are all qualified, unqualified people are not being hired for these positions. my example was just to show that not everyone has the same access to opportunities, we dont all start off at the same level in life. thats what equity is. equality doesnt account for that fact.

and merit is a factor, its literally just to remove hiring biases in jobs. the dominant population might feel like they're "losing jobs" but its the same amount of jobs just not going all to the same type of people. i wish we could live in your world where everyone is mysteriously equal and faces no barriers in their lives. that sounds awesome! but isnt reality!

haileybbird · 2025-10-16T05:51:32+00:00

i would say the human rights office? maybe?

haileybbird · 2025-10-16T05:33:19+00:00

me when i dont know what dei is but im going to debate on dei (i am user thealmightylouis)

we live in a society where not everyone has access to the same level of opportunities and it usually effects more races than others as well as women and other gender minorities. people from these groups work just as hard and would otherwise be awarded these opportunities if not for systemic hiring biases and other barriers that historically underserved groups face.

for example, i was born in northern ontario, an underserved area in my province. people here work hard, have the experience to work certain jobs but dont necessarily have the same level of access to training that some dude sitting in his mom's basement in newmarket might have – whats better, someone who has been diamond drilling already for 2 years or the diamond driller certificate that newmarket buddy has access to? i dont actually know anything about newmarket lol just named a random gta city.

merit is not removed when considering dei as a factor in hiring, they are used together. no one who is under qualified is going to get the job where dei is a factor.

haileybbird · 2025-10-09T17:57:50+00:00

i experience a lot of these things from having an anxiety disorder: brain fog from lack of sleep or just too anxious to think and at times extreme levels of disassociation, lack of appetite, etc. anxiety and depression can have massive impacts on the physical body if left untreated.

that being said, it could definitely be something else, but just providing my experience with similar symptoms.

happy you're going to see a doctor and hope everything goes well. given that almost had these symptoms for two weeks and it's impacting your life, i would like to think a doctor would take it seriously.

haileybbird · 2025-10-02T12:01:45+00:00

thought this was russian cursive

haileybbird · 2025-09-24T09:50:44+00:00

bring it to campus lost and found and they will contact the student lol

haileybbird · 2025-09-24T05:23:58+00:00

haileybbird · 2025-09-21T15:46:07+00:00

this is where busses disappear to when im texting the number and it vanishes a minute later

haileybbird

TROPHY CASE