Snasser

I emailed SSHRC last night just to see if they might give me some more info. Mme Bigras responded that results should be available to FGS's middle to late next week, with letters sent out after that. She also confirmed that disclosure of award status by FGS's is their sole discretion and has nothing to do with SSHRC. Gah! As for pubs or no pubs: I have several pubs and presentations in Canada and the US, my major handicap is that I completed my MA in 2003, before MA SSHRCs were ever offered (I don't know if I would have been offered one, but I was also never able to find out). I am really worried that the committee(s) will not take the date of my MA into account when they assess why I was never awarded an MA SSHRC.

Hi dramanda, if you also think that I am writing crapy proposals, then how come I got Dean's Fellowship from our med school in the amount of 20,000$ for 4 years? I submitted the same proposal. In addition, my proposal ranked number 1 in the School of Medicine when submitted to the School of Graduate Studies. And if it was crapy, why SGS would choose it and send it to SSHRC? Is it so difficult to acknowledge that mistakes can happen and SSHRC messed up my file?

Way to go!!

I've always had to confirm external awards with snail mail. Given SSHRC's apparent trepidation over all things electronic, my bet would remain with letter mail. I agree that the new pool should regard first contact in whatever form it may arrive.

That is sage advice, Cree8tiveGyal. I think I will assume the same. The haphazard manner in which this year's competition seems to have been handled is disconcerting: I certainly don't have greater confidence in SSHRC's administrators and with all of this cr@p related to business related degrees and the extreme delays that are never accompanied with satisfying explanations I will admit that my faith in the review process has been shaken. To respond to an earlier question about whether SSHRC is permitted to access grades that did not appear on the transcripts we submitted in our applications: a friend who received a Doc SSHRC last year told me that our grad chair admitted that SSHRC had contacted our department for autumn grades. Whether this is kosher, I have no idea. Beggars can't be choosers, so I have never read the fine print very clearly. Congratulations MA SSHRC people! Celebration time! Pass some of your SSHRC mojo on to us PhDs! My bet for Doc SSHRC announcements is May 14; mailed out on the following Monday.

My spidey-sense says Friday or even next Monday. But earlier would be better. Mind you, right now I still don't know. This feeling may be preferable to knowing that I don't have an award and have to schlep my way through the application process again.

If you applied for the MA SSHRC and your university has sent your application to Ottawa you are basically guaranteed an award.

same in history.

It's so hard to balance publish or perish with publish *and* perish!

To get a PhD SSHRC, you need at least one publication or major conference paper (probably more). At the MA level, grades are the most important.

Definitely in a letter.

That is exactly what I wonder. Perhaps it is false hope, though.

Ohhh. That is an evil question. It's a bit like the Lady or the Tiger, isn't it? I suppose I would choose option one and find out right now. Even with a CGS in two month's time I would be forced to spend most of it on therapy!

It's supporting Canadians researching, not researchers in Canada. This is also why foreign students studying in Canada cannot apply for SSHRC.

The doctoral success rate is roughly 50-60%. Our university grants crafter suggested this in the fall. The quota of applications that each university can forward to SSHRC is based on the previous year's success rate. So the more successful applications they forwarded the year before means a highter quota for the next. The success rate for each discipline varies quite a bit, I believe, simply because it is a lot easier to make a Sociology or IR application sound relevant than one proposing research in early-medieval Flemish pre-socratic philosophy (for anyone about to point out the anachronisms and impossibilities in this statement, my tongue is planted firmly in cheek). Our grants crafter also mentioned that since major funding cuts in the 90s, SSHRC has felt greater pressure to support research that seems relevant to the general public so that they can more easily approach the government with hat in hand. This all being said, relevant is a nebulous term that applies to many disciplines and even to early-medieval Flemish pre-socratic philosophy.

Also, I was notified that I'd made the A-list in mid-December. I'll need a padded cell after all of this is over!

You're right, boo to him. I figure we have a right to feel anxious: it's a guaranteed pay cheque and it's a tangible sign of recognition for hard work. I have made a lot of sacrifices to get here, and it would feel really good to get an 'atta boy' for that.

You have my sympathy. It's hard for partners not involved in academics to 'get' just how important and how elusive all of this stuff is. I'm lucky because be husband is also an academic so he's familiar with the granting agencies and their processed, but most of my friends who brilliantly left school eons ago to go out and get real jobs and kids and mortgages have no idea why I'm so caught up in this. Their world simply isn't as cut-throat. Anyway, hang in there. You can make him take you out when you get your award!

It's like you have a window into my life. I have also heard that there is a revolt against Harper's call for funding business related degrees: afterall, 'experts' are supposed to determine where funding is suposed to be going and they would literally have to pass over better applicants to choose more mediocre ones in order to fulfill Harper's wishes. To me it demonstrates his hopeless ignorance of both the funding process and the purpose of research. Any 'business-related' degree funded today will not effect the economy (if it does at all) for several years.

Oh well. I guess I just have to accept that I'm going to turn into a basket case. Sheesh!

I'm just so sick with worry every time I think of it. I suspect that we will begin hearing this week. This means that this will be either a very exciting or terribly dissapointing week for all of us. I don't want to imagine that I'll win so that the dissapointment won't feel so shattering; at the same time, I don't even want to think of what it will feel like not to win. I'm stuck between a rock and a hard place. My ability to travel for research will hinge on this award. gah!

It was my understanding from the application process that successful mid-program applicants can begin receiving their scholarship in either May or September, and the choice is the applicant's. This would imply that there has to be enough turn around time between notification, acceptance and the transfer of payment to the host university to make the May choice available.

I have a friend who was awarded a PhD CGS for a proposal to study at Dal, but she ended up on the West Coast - so it shouldn't matter.

This is precisely how I feel. I am terrified of the fall-out for next year and I do not want to be competing then.

Cuts have already affected NSERC and CIHR funding. My husband is a PhD candidate in Natural Sciences at a university with a very well-respected medical school and only one of their post-docs received any funding this year - and she has 27 publications. For some reason, Harper decided to slash at science and engineering before attacking the social sciences and humanities.