The Vanier Canada Graduate Scholarship (Vanier CGS) program helps Canada’s institutions attract highly qualified doctoral students. Vanier Scholars demonstrate leadership skills and a high standard of scholarly achievement in the social sciences and humanities, natural sciences and engineering, and health-related fields.
Both Canadian and international students are eligible to be nominated for a Vanier Scholarship, which is valued at $50,000 per year for up to three years.
Typically, the University of Windsor may submit up to two nominations each to NSERC and SSHRC, and one nomination to CIHR.
Eligibility
- To be considered for a Vanier Scholarship, a student must be nominated by a Canadian university. Vanier Scholarships must be held by the student at the university that nominated them. The scholarships are not transferable: they may not be taken to another university.
- Applicants do not have to be registered as doctoral students at the time of application, but if they are not they must have applied for admission to a PhD program at UWindsor by the departmental nomination deadline.
- Canadian citizens, Permanent Residents, and international students are all eligible for Vanier Scholarships.
- Students who have held or are currently holding Tri-Agency scholarship funding for their doctoral program are not eligible to apply.
- Please see the Vanier Scholarship website
for complete eligibility criteria:
Application Details
Nominations are invited using the following process.
Current and prospective students will complete their Vanier application using ResearchNet , the online application system.
Procedures
As required by the Vanier program applicants must do the following by the deadline noted above:
- notify the chosen graduate program that they intend to apply for the Vanier Scholarship
- be currently registered in, or have applied to, a PhD program at the University of Windsor
- provide official transcripts for all post-secondary studies showing the most recent grades. UWindsor students must submit official copies supplied by the Registrar's Office.
- transcripts are to be submitted to the applicant's prospective graduate program, not the Faculty of Graduate Studies
- the graduate program may have copies of the applicant's official transcripts on file already; if so, the applicant must confirm with the graduate program which transcripts the program has and is willing to provide to support the Vanier application, and which official transcripts the applicant must provide to the graduate program
- request four separate letters of support, as follows
- two letters from referees assessing the applicant's academic excellence, research potential and demonstrated and potential leadership ability. These are submitted electronically through ResearchNet by the referee
- two Leadership Reference letters are to be provided to the applicant, who uploads the letters to his or her electronic application file. Faculty members may provide this letter, as long as they know the applicant in a non-academic capacity and are addressing leadership in a non-academic environment. It is recommended that applicants request the Leadership Reference Letters from an author that has not provided an assessment of the nomination; however, applications that contain Leadership Reference Letters and a Referee Assessment written by the same faculty member are accepted.
- applicants should provide potential referees with the Vanier selection criteria guidelines
- submit a completed Vanier application via ResearchNet by the deadline.
Note: The Graduate Awards Committee will review the completed nominations and may request revisions to enhance the competitiveness of the applications.