NSERC at Queen's

[alanabanana]

I was wondering if any NSERC award holders out there from queen's could give an idea of the average GPA of a successful applicant?

[osteon]

Not sure about Queen's specifically, but at uOttawa they don't even consider your application unless your GPA in your last 2 years is 3.7 or higher. Even so, you are unlikely to get funding at the MSc level with a 3.7. The way they do it is as follows:

 

Calculate everyones 2 year GPA, then rank order the list. Those below cutoff are immediately removed. For those remaining, based on your position on the list, you are assigned a percentage (for MSc it is out of 50, for PhD it's out of 30). They do the same for the research (worth 30% for MSc and 50% for PhD, if i recall correctly) and leadership (20% for both) components. The top 10-20 applicants overall will get recommended to NSERC (or CIHR), and about 80% of those sent will be successful in the end. I believe the average MSc 2 year gpa for CIHR was around 3.88-3.92 at uOttawa - NSERC was probably close to that. For PhD, the GPAs were probably a little lower since they arent worth as much.

 

The breakdowns I listed apply to ALL Canadian universities as they are the guidelines put forth by the agencies.

 

Take note there's no separate review whether your MSc or PhD. Everyone is reviewed the same and the best applications are sent. So it's more about GPA for a mSc applicant and more about research for a PhD applicant.

[medhopeful64]

For the Biology department, the cutoff last year was an 84% (in only your bio courses.)

[psqu]

It varies by department. The USRA recipients that I know in my department had cGPAs >4.0/4.3.

[Jaybird]

Wait, considering that Queen's uses the 4.3 GPA system, osteon, do you mean 3.7/4.3 (B+?) or 3.7/4.0 (A)?

[osteon]

For MSc and PhD awards (OGS, anything from the tri-council) the cutoff is usually around 3.7/4.0, or 80% or A- or whatever that works out to in any other GPA format.