Between 1957 and 1960, MacLeod studied at St. Francis Xavier University earning a BA and B.Ed. He then went on to receive his MA in 1961 from the University of New Brunswick. He decided to study for a PhD at the University of Notre Dame in Indiana because Frank O'Malley taught creative writing there. MacLeod said he was used to analyzing the work of other authors, but wanted to start writing himself. That wouldn't have happened, he added, if he had not attended such a "creative, imaginative university."