ogopogo

Maybe I'm the only one who has never heard of this custom, and perhaps I've always been terribly rude to my referees in the past :oops:, but is it common for people to thank them with gifts? I mean, I always say 'thank you' and let them know about the results, but a gift almost seems like...a bribe?

I like the cartoon t-shirt idea, but if you are feeling particularly snarky, 'more than you' is usually sufficient. :wink: Otherwise, proceed directly to the 'scientific study of how language works, rather than learning languages themselves' lecture, tack on an impressive list of languages you have some familiarity with, and presto: someone else who now thinks you are a very clever dork.

I'm not sure how encouraging this will be, but I've been accepted to the McGill program twice now, so I figured you might want to know what my applications looked like. I don't think you need all this to get in - it's more important that you fit in well with the research agendas of the profs than anything else - but this is what I did: 2002 application: Degree in Ling (4.0 GPA) from a top Canadian school, with one year on exchange at McGill (so I knew some of the profs). I had a couple of (co-authored) conference presentations and published abstracts and 2 years of lab/research assistant work (with national granting council funding in the summers). 2009 application: the above qualifications plus an MA in Ling from a top Canadian school (4.0 GPA) funded by a national granting council. 4 peer-reviewed papers in major publications, one as first author, a bunch of conference presentations, and several years of fieldwork plus teaching at the university level in Canada (language classes) and abroad (linguistics classes). Also, I got in touch with the people I was interested in working with the summer before I applied to remind them that I existed and to sound out the types of research proposals they would support. (This is a very good idea no matter where you are applying!) Just to note, I think one reason that it's so difficult to get in is that they guarantee a minimum level of funding for all their students for 5 years, so they can only admit as many students as they have the $$ for. The letter I got from them made reference to 'dozens of highly qualified people' and I've noticed that they cap the grad level classes at 10 people on the course listings site so that gives you some idea of acceptance rates. I'd say don't wait around, start reading papers published by McGill faculty and then communicate your enthusiasm for their research to them directly. And honestly, if it were me, I might be okay with taking the qualifying year courses since I can't begin to imagine how difficult the first year would be without that background. Regardless, it is a fantastic place to study, and I wish you the best of luck in your applications.

Definitely feeling rusty. I'll have been out of school for almost 5 years when I go back in September and, while I have been working in my field, in that time I haven't given more than a second thought to some of the more difficult subjects I'll be studying. yikes! I'm actually still too afraid to look at my old notes so you are a step ahead of me, and certainly not alone in needing to work off a little rust.

813 people applied to SSHRC directly this year, according to the letter they sent me, so the 255 that made it into the 2nd round would represent about 30% of applicants. So yeah, a lot of people weren't lucky this year. hmmm...I wonder what percentage of applications were forwarded on to SSHRC by each of the big schools this year...

I do know people studying in the states who have the SSHRC doctoral awards, but I think a few of them got the award before they started their studies, and I don't know what they wrote on the application about where they planned to go. I would think since you applied from outside of a Canadian university you would probably have the same chance as all the other 'external' applicants in the first round though. Are you serious jackassjim? You know someone who made it to the national competition and then got a rejection letter from SSHRC? Already? It's not even April! And here I've been trying so hard not to even think about waiting for the mail. I hope you aren't just teasing us hopeful SSHRCers, we're wound pretty tight this time of year so that would really be living up to your moniker.

thewesternsky - there are places near UBC within your budget if you want to live on your own. For example, at the end of August I will be vacating my one bedroom basement suite in the Dunbar neighbourhood and it is currenly costing us $800/month including everything but phone and internet, with private w/d & dishwasher, small pets allowed, a few blocks from busses, but across the street from Pacific Spirit Park bike/walking trails that lead straight to UBC. Of course there's no guarantee the landlords won't raise the rent when we leave, but that gives you an idea of what a decent place might cost and include. If you haven't found it yet, a good place to look for housing close to UBC is the AMS rentsline website http://www.amsrentsline.com/.

I think only people who applied directly to SSHRC get a letter with a score, and that's all it says, nothing about weighting or anything. I think you might be able to find a scoresheet for individual schools' ranking procedures online but that doesn't really help at this stage.

Thanks for pointing me to the right part of the spreadsheet jasper.milvain - I missed that stat the first time around and for some reason I always thought you had a much better chance applying through a school. The whole 'dice toss' aspect isn't so exciting, but well, I guess that's the same for everyone when dealing with SSHRC. I looked elsewhere on the web and, for the information of any other externals, scores seem to drop in the second round by anywhere between 0.4 and 10 points, with people receiving scores of around 20 in the final competition getting funded. I keep hearing mid April for results dramanda, although I have no even remotely official sources for that, and in past years some people haven't found out until early May. If you did apply through your school though, some higher ups get access to results earlier than anyone else and often pass that info along to students through grad studies or their departments.

Just wondering if anyone else applied to the SSHRC doctoral competition as an external applicant this year? I'm one of the lucky 255 (out of 813) applicants who made it to the second round so now I'm nervously awaiting the final results in April. I've heard that scores can drop dramatically between phases, so even a really good one in the first round doesn't mean much in terms of getting funding - anyone know anything more about that? I guess I should just appreciate that at least I got one big 'good news' SSHRC envelope in the mail this year and can only realistically check the mail once a day between the start of April and whenever they actually release the results.