There must be more to how they make use of the scores because I got a 17.3 and was awarded the 4 year doctoral scholarship. Perhaps you need a higher score if you are in your 2nd, 3rd, or 4th year, or perhaps there are discipline or university quotas (e.g. X number go to each university) in place that influence why some people may be rejected with a 17.4 when others are not. I don't know what my initial score was, but I was ranked first in my department and given an award (by my department) for my proposal. I was hoping for the CGS, but it looks like I just squeaked by with the doctoral. Its hard to guess where/why points are taken off, but I had one professor tell me he liked my proposal but thought both my master's research and proposed PhD research were too ambitious and he would have taken off points for it. I think previous history has a lot to do with it too. I have seen people get awards with very weak proposals, but they had a strong record of awards and went to several conference in their undergrad. I had a limited number of awards and academic publications in my undergrad (and I did not get SSHRC for my MA), which I think hurt me a lot too. Here is some cheery news for those who missed out: many departments at McGill (and I suspect other universities) are starting to guarantee PhD students funding for 4 years at an amount that is not all that much less than SSHRC. The same day I got my letter from SSHRC I was called in to be told I would be stripped of almost all the money my department guaranteed me because I won an external fellowship. At one point, it actually looked like I would be guaranteed more money if had I won SSHRC in my 2nd or 3rd year instead of the 1st because of all the money they were taking back (we are currently disputing the wording of my funding offer...it turns out my department was hit with a major budget cut and they seem to be dealing with it by withdrawing as much support as they can from SSHRC winners). You can't win!
