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Graduate Scholarship Adjustment Policy

Understanding Scholarship Fund Distribution at McMaster

The School of Graduate Studies and Faculty of Social Sciences (SGS/FSS) scholarship funding for graduate students comes from two primary sources, which each program utilizes to support its graduate students.

McMaster University

The School of Graduate Studies (SGS) obtains scholarship funds from the university and allocates them to the six McMaster Faculties: Business, Engineering, Health Sciences, Humanities, Science, and Social Sciences.

The distribution is determined by the number and type of graduate students enrolled in each Faculty’s programs.

Faculty of Social Sciences

The Faculty of Social Sciences (FSS) also offers a smaller internal source of scholarship funding.

These funds are allocated to Social Science graduate programs based on the number and type of graduate students enrolled in each program.

How External Scholarships Affect SGS/FSS Funding

School of Graduate Studies and Faculty of Social Sciences scholarship funding is adjusted when a student receives a scholarship from an external source, such as Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC), Ontario Graduate Scholarship (OGS), or an endowed scholarship.

Adjusting internally provided School of Graduate Studies and Faculty of Social Sciences scholarship funding serves two main purposes:

  1. To distribute funding more equitably among all graduate students.
  2. To support professional activities, such as conference attendance and field study.

Enhancing Support Through Scholarship Adjustments

According to this policy, when a student receives scholarship funding from an external source (e.g., Vanier, SSHRC, OGS, or Harry Lyman Hooker Sr. Fellowship, with some exceptions as noted below), their School of Graduate Studies and Faculty of Social Sciences scholarship funding is reduced.

The redirected funds are used to enhance support for students without external scholarships, often bringing them near or just above the funding floor.

Key Points

  1. Adjustments apply exclusively to SGS/FSS funding; external non-SGS/FSS awards remain unchanged.
  2. The adjustment never completely eliminates a student’s SGS/FSS scholarship funding.
  3. The adjustment policy is progressive, with larger adjustments for students receiving greater SGS/FSS scholarship funding and/or larger external, non-SGS/FSS funding.
  4. All SGS/FSS funding freed up by external scholarship adjustments remains in the scholarship pool to support graduate students; none is returned to the FSS or SGS.