Vanier Canada Graduate Scholarships

Value and duration: $50,000 per year for 3 years (non-renewable)

Sept. 5, 2024, before 9:59 p.m. (Mountain): AU internal deadline to submit completed application (including leadership letters of reference, referee assessments, and other attached documents as described in Vanier’s application instructions) through the appropriate portal (see Application procedures).

Sept. 6 to 27, 2024: FGS Awards Review Committee reviews applications for eligibility and merit. Meritorious applications may receive feedback and students’ applications may be returned to them for revisions.

Oct. 25, 2023, before 11:59 pm (Mountain): Deadline to submit final draft of Vanier application through the appropriate portal (see Application Procedures).

Oct. 30, 2024: Deadline for institutions to submit nominations to the Vanier CGS program.

April 2024: Anticipated notification of results. Nominees will be notified by email when the results are available on ResearchNet.

May 1, 2024, Sept. 1, 2024, or Jan. 1, 2025: Payments begin.

To be considered for a Vanier CGS, you must:

• be nominated by only one Canadian institution, which must have received a Vanier CGS quota;
• be pursuing your first doctoral degree (including joint program such as MD/PhD, DVM/PhD, or JD/PhD, MBA/PhD - if it has a demonstrated and significant research component);
• intend to pursue, in the summer semester or the academic year following the announcement of results, full-time doctoral (or a joint graduate research program such as MD/PhD, DVM/PhD, JD/PhD, MBA/PhD) studies and research at the nominating institution; For joint graduate research programs, only the PhD portion of the program is eligible for funding.
• have completed no more than 20 months of full-time study in your doctoral program as of May 1, 2025;
  • The doctoral program would begin after the completion of a master's degree. The months of study completed are calculated from the doctoral enrolment date.
• have completed no more than 32 months of full-time study in your doctoral program (i.e., joint graduate research program, directly from bachelor's, previously enrolled without obtaining master's degree, transferring or withdrew from program), by May 1, 2025 if:
  • enrolled in a joint graduate research program, e.g., MD/PhD, MA/PhD, MS/PhD, DVM/PhD. Applicants in this category have access to the 32-month window whether or not they were previously enrolled in a master's program:
    • The months of study are calculated starting from the date on which an applicant is officially registered in the joint graduate program. (For MA/PhD or MS/PhD, this will be the master's registration date).
  • enrolled directly from a bachelor's to a PhD program (without having been previously enrolled in another graduate program);
    • The months of study completed are calculated from the doctoral enrolment date.
  • previously enrolled in a master's program without obtaining the degree, transferring or withdrawing from the program and subsequently starting a doctoral program.
    • The months of study completed are calculated from the original master's enrolment date.
• have achieved a first-class average, as determined by your institution, in each of the last two years of full-time study or equivalent. Candidates are encouraged to contact the institution for its definition of a first-class average; and
  • Note: Institutions may, at their discretion, accept Vanier CGS applications from individuals who have not obtained a first-class average; contact your proposed host institutions to determine their use of this eligibility criterion.
• cannot have already received a doctoral-level scholarship or fellowship from CIHR, NSERC or SSHRC to undertake or complete a doctoral program.

1. Applications are initiated in 1 of 2 ways. Either:
2. The student informs the faculty of graduate studies at the selected institution of their intent to apply to the Vanier CGS program; or
3. The institution initiates the nomination process by contacting the desired candidate.
4. Applications are prepared by the student and submitted to the nominating institution by their internal deadline(set in ResearchNet by the nominating institution) using the ResearchNet application system.
5. The nominating institution performs the internal candidate selection process.
6. The nominating institution forwards recommended nominations to the Vanier-Banting Secretariat (the Secretariat) by 6:00 p.m. (Mountain) on Oct. 31.
7. The Secretariat coordinates the review process.
8. The Secretariat presents the recommendations to the Tri-Agency Programs (TAP) Steering Committee.
9. The TAP Steering Committee endorses and approves final decisions for the Vanier CGS program.
10. Nominated candidates are notified of the competition results in April of the following year.

For full details, visit Vanier application/nomination instructions.

The FGS Awards Review Committee will review all applications for eligibility and merit. If FGS returns the application to you, you will receive an email from ResearchNet containing their comments. You will be given a revised institution deadline date by which you must re-submit your application. Your application will move back to the "Current Activities" tab so that you can modify your application and re-submit it to FGS. AU will not be able to view your application while you are editing it.

Once you have completed all changes, you must resubmit your application to FGS for review before the institutional internal deadline.

If AU nominates your application, institutional officials will electronically approve and submit your nomination to the Vanier CGS competition. You will receive an automated email from ResearchNet acknowledging receipt shortly after the nominating institution's deadline date. If you do not receive this confirmation email, you should contact fgsawards@athabascau.ca to determine the status of your application/nomination.

Nominees will be notified by email when the results are available on ResearchNet in early April of the following year.