Funding opportunities for study in Canada

[shockwave]

Hi everyone. I am an American student, who is interested in applying to several Canadian universities. I am aware that more "prestigious" universities such as UT, UBC, Alberta, will provide me with funding regarding of my citizenship, so long as I am accepted. However, there are some schools where the funding descriptions are rather vague(such as the University of Ottawa, Dalhousie, amongst others), where they say things like "limited funding is available for international students", "funding is offered to international students though is very competitive", things like that, and I know some schools have pretty much no funding at all for international students.

So basically I was wondering what the likelihood of receiving funding at such a university was and how international students typically went about receiving funding for study in Canada?

Thanks.

[TakeruK]

Most funding packages in Canada do not include a tuition waiver*, but instead, the stipend is calculated with the fact that you must pay tuition in mind. International students will have to pay a higher tuition rate (usually twice as much as domestic students in graduate school), and also have additional fees (since you are not covered by our provincial health care programs). However, in almost all cases, this difference is offset by an extra award given to international graduate students only (but sometimes the offset award doesn't actually cover all of the extra costs).

This extra offset award is usually the "very competitive"/"limited" part. In my current school (in the same category as Ottawa, Dalhousie, etc.), each department has a quota of "International Student Tuition Awards" where the money comes from the Graduate School/University. Say there are X awards available. So, at any given time, the department can have up to X international students and it won't cost them any more than a domestic student. However, the department is able to support more than X international students if, for example, the supervisor agrees to pay the difference themselves. So, international student positions can be competitive, since you have to compete for one of X spots, or impress the supervisor enough for them to agree to pay the extra amount.

Different departments/fields may handle things slightly differently. Our department also has its own funding set aside to pay a portion of each student's stipend as well as increase the number of international student positions available. In a recent department meeting, the profs discussed the fact that the department is currently at quota for international students and they voted to all increase their share of each student's stipend (domestic and international) to relieve the burden on the department's graduate funding source, to basically make room for more international students that are really impressive but a supervisor is currently out of funding. So this could be another reason why international funding is stated as being competitive (and perhaps this is more applicable in the social sciences where profs don't always directly fund their students, so I've been told).

In most cases, your letter of offer will state the funding you are going to receive. In departments that normally fully fund their domestic students, generally international students will only be accepted if they are going to be funded too. This could make it harder to get in as an international student but the idea is that once you are in, your net funding is the same as the domestic students.

* Note: At least not the way the US handles it -- there may be an award given with a value close to the cost of tuition, you will receive it as award money then have to pay it back to the University in a separate transaction.

Edited August 11, 2012 by TakeruK