Got my mail sent to my home address in waterloo...even after I clearly wrote that my "mailing" address is in Toronto (at my department), so I have no idea when it arrived.
I know for a fact that the results were given to the university at the latest on the 24/25th of March, cuz I confirmed with both my department and grad studies last week.
I got a PGS D3, but fingers crossed that I get upgraded that 14 k/yr will do wonders for my bank account...
For those who are wondering, yes, they do upgrade people, tho how I do not know.
For my masters, I got the letter in mid Apr saying that my NSERC got upgraded to a CGS.
I suspect that they go by division and then overall ranking if they have any receipients declining or downgrading.
For those who didn't get NSERC, there could be a number of reasons, but I can tell you for a fact that if you apply in your last year at a university and do not intend to stay at that university for the degree you're applying for, they will likely reject you at the university level if not the departmental level. They will give you a bogus excuse, all to maximize the success rate of people who are already a grad student at the university. I know because it happened to me. Having straight A's for my masters degree of 2 yrs and they tell me I don't have the marks to get an NSERC is pure bull.
Also, your proposal is VERY VERY IMPORTANT. For PGSD at least, your proposal is the only way the can judge your research potential aside from your referee report. It's worth the time to ask the writing center of your university to look at your proposal/thesis summary/other freeform sections. They will be able to tell you, from experience, whether it has a chance or not. Publishing papers is good, but lets face it, you'd be lucky if you get 1 paper out of your masters, especially if you're in some field where publishing papers is hard, publishing in a good journal is harder. Also, if you are in a multidisciplinary field like biomedical engineering, be careful on how you spin your project proposal. Phrased incorrectly can have your application sent to the life sci panel, who will have no idea what you're talking about when you say optimization and thermodynamic equilibrium
