Ashbury College - Review #1

I did six years at Ashbury and I still do not fully know how to explain the house system to people who did not go there. You get sorted into one of four houses and then you just start caring about house points. It is irrational and everyone knows it and everyone does it anyway. I was in Woollcombe and sat on House Council which meant I knew people in grade nine and grade twelve at the same time. That part was actually great. Being Student House Prefect senior year sounds better on paper than it was in practice because most of the job was settling dumb arguments and convincing people to show up to events they did not want to attend.

Investments Club gave me direction. That is the honest answer. I came into Ashbury not knowing what I wanted and left knowing I wanted finance. That club was a Wednesday afternoon thing that turned into a career path. Student House Prefect taught me how to handle responsibility when things go wrong, which they do.

I would have joined Investments Club in grade nine instead of grade eleven. Two years of learning about markets that I missed. My advice is to find the thing that connects to what you actually want to do and start it early. Not for applications. For yourself.

Ashbury gave me direction. That is the simplest way to put it. I came in not knowing and I left knowing and the clubs and house stuff and classes all pointed me somewhere. That is worth more than a transcript.

If you care about finance at all join the Investments Club. If you do not join it anyway and see. Go to World Affairs too. The dining hall conversations are better than the food. And do not stress about day student versus boarder because both work. Find your people and show up.

Ashbury does not go easy on you. The material is challenging and the workload piles up. What saved me was how willing the teachers were to actually help. If I did not get something I could stay after class and they would walk me through it again without acting like I was wasting their time. The hard part was never the schoolwork itself. It was juggling schoolwork with clubs and house commitments and whatever else I had signed up for. Some weeks you just accept that something is getting done at 1am.

I was never on a varsity team and nobody made me feel bad about it. Ashbury had options if you wanted them and space if you did not. I used the fitness centre when I needed it. The serious athletes had their teams and their practices. Everyone coexisted fine which is not always true at schools like this.

I went to a few shows because friends were in them. The theatre kids were genuinely talented. I did not have time between Investments Club and house stuff. Respect from a distance.

Investments Club and World Affairs Club were my two main things. Both ended up shaping my career path which still feels kind of absurd to say. House Council and the Prefect role taught me how to deal with people and solve problems that do not have a clean answer. Ashbury has plenty of clubs. The trick is actually showing up to something instead of just reading the list.

I was a day student so I did not board. But I had friends in the houses and spent enough time there to understand the setup. Boarders had a built in social life from day one. Day students had to build their own. I was jealous sometimes. Other times I was glad I could go home and sleep in my own bed.

The dining hall was fine. The food was food. The real value was that everyone ended up there at the same time. You would go in for a quick meal and end up sitting for an hour because someone sat down next to you. Half my friendships actually happened in that room.

Ottawa is underrated as a school city. It is big enough to have things going on but not so big that you feel like a nobody. Downtown is close. Restaurants everywhere. The Rideau Centre when you need to buy something. Parliament is right there so sometimes you walk past protests or events and the city feels alive. I did not appreciate that until I moved to Halifax and realized not every city has that energy.

You know people across grades. Groups overlap. I had friends from Investments Club, from house stuff, from classes. Nobody was weird about it. You could float between groups and that was normal.