naimulkhan

guys I have a question. I started my PhD in Fall 2010, just became a Canadian permanent Residence (eligible, albeit a little late lol). On the NSERC website I see the following. Does this mean that I can still apply? It will be 28 months of my Doctoral studies by December 31. Also, is it worth it? Do they actually awart 2 year scholarships? You will be eligible for only a two-year CGS/PGS D, if: you previously held a two-year PGS A or IPS 1*; you previously held a one-year CGS M or PGS M plus a PGS M Extension; or you have completed more than the full-time equivalent of 12 months of your doctoral program (24 months if you were admitted to the doctoral program directly from your bachelor’s program) as of December 31 of the year that you apply for the CGS/PGS D.

I missed the cut by 3 positions. They told me additional awards are available through declined awards and early termination of previous awards. Declined is less likely, but early termination is possible. I won't get my hopes up though, but I will be a little hopeful too, if that makes sense lol!

Hmm I guess I feel a little better knowing I didn't miss it by one or two positions, five is..acceptable I guess haha. Mind telling us what was your ranking? The sucky part for me is that I am an international student, so this is the only BIG scholarship I can apply for. Hope my goddamned PR application gets approved before next year's deadline for PGS/CGS :X.

This is from the current page on application details: "Once submitted to the appropriate granting agency, each nomination is evaluated by an agency-specific selection committee. Each selection committee recommends the top 55 or 56 candidates (for a total of 167 candidates between all three granting agencies) to the Selection Board based on the nominee's academic and research potential, as well as their leadership skills." So I guess I was rejected by the selection board, BLAH! Why am I still trolling this forum, I really don't know. Just very disappointed I guess.

Well seems like I am the unluckiest applicant this year. sighz, thanks for the kind words guys, but a person will probably have to be crazy to turn Vanier CGS down lol.

if the cut was 54 I am going to kill myself lol

Damn I was ranked 55 out of 204 (NSERC), score 6 out of 9. Looks like I JUST missed the cut:(. Congratulations to people who got it!

Be very specific and short, and do not be generic. Do not copy-paste the same mail to everyone. You should make them understand that you have done a little bit of research on them. Try to go through some of their recent papers (very tedious and time consuming, but you have to do it), and talk about some specific aspect. You don't have to propose anything ground breaking in your e-mail, just try to show that you have done some research on them. Do not attach anything in the first mail, I have seen my professor getting very annoyed with all the attachments. Politely ask them in the last sentence "If you are interested, I can send you my detailed resume and unofficial transcripts". I had a very nice example specifically for computer science, from some professor's personal website. I will post it here if I can find it. And yah, if someone specifically mentions not to contact them, do not do that. Also, in most of the cases they won't even reply ( I read somewhere that the e-mail to reply ratio is 30:1), but don't lose hope. If you can get one of them interested, you are all set for PhD. Good luck!

ah u r from my field I see, my specialization is in comp. vision too:D. I can't help you with school rankings though, as I am from Canada. Of course, you should try your best to publish the work you have done for the course. But I don't know if that would be enough to show your research potential. Most of the times they look into one application for a really short period (specially during first stage of screening), so one publication might not be good enough. What you should try start doing from now is, and I can not stress it enough, CONTACT POTENTIAL SUPERVISORS. I know this can be very tedious, but this is something which increases your chance of getting accepted by at least 50%. Go to their personal websites, see what kind of research they do, keep your e-mails short. Some of them even have specific guidelines for potential students too.