Total budget (in local currency) and country of purchase. Please do not use USD unless purchasing in the US:
650 CAD at most, preferably in the 400-500 range

Are you open to refurbs/used?
Only refurbs.

How would you prioritize form factor (ultrabook, 2-in-1, etc.), build quality, performance, and battery life?
Battery life = performance > build quality > form factory (Battery life ~7 to 8 hours with relatively fast speeds, so maybe 8gb of RAM?)

How important is weight and thinness to you?
Not important, but lighter laptops would be good.

Do you have a preferred screen size? If indifferent, put N/A.
N/A

Are you doing any CAD/video editing/photo editing/gaming? List which programs/games you desire to run.
For school only, so no gaming. Will be using chrome, word, pptx, spotify and possible excel. Might have around 5-6 programs open.

If you're gaming, do you have certain games you want to play? At what settings and FPS do you want?
N/A

Any specific requirements such as good keyboard, reliable build quality, touch-screen, finger-print reader, optical drive or good input devices (keyboard/touchpad)?
Touch screen, fingerprint reader are not necessary. Preferably a moderately good keyboard and input device. Optical Drives would not be needed. Full-size keyboards would not be necessary.

Leave any finishing thoughts here that you may feel are necessary and beneficial to the discussion.
I do not like pointing sticks.