Graduate funding in Canada

[danaeris]

Canadian Graduate Scholarships are distributed by three agencies:
NSERC, which handles physical sciences and engineering
CIHR, which handles health related research
SSHRC, which handles humanities and arts social sciences related research.

SSHRC receives 60% of the funds distributed by this program.

This seems ludicrous. I would have expected it to be a third at most.

I'm wondering if maybe this is because graduate students in science, engineering, and health research receive some other form of funding directly from their universities. Edit: Do most or even many graduate students in science, engineering, and health research receive stipends similar to those at US universities? (i.e. ranging from tuition+16K to tuition+24K)

If not, WTF?

I suppose I shouldn't complain, since next year I might be a beneficiary of SSHRC's generous portion of this pie. But this distribution just doesn't seem right.

Comments

[secretsoflife.livejournal.com]

a lot of science and health research is from private / corporate funds. as well, there are probably more people doing social science research. i think that explains the funding split....

[danaeris.livejournal.com]

But do you think that MOST grad students in science, engineering, and health research receive stipends upon acceptance in Canada?

[dagibbs.livejournal.com]

Cause the arts students need grants cause there's no way they'll get a job to pay back loans?

Oh, was that my outside voice?

More seriously, what's the break down in numbers of graduate students applying? Does the money breakdown match the quantity of students in each field? The quantity applying for grants?

[icedrake.livejournal.com]

response to part a:
Die, Dave. Die.

Response to part b: I was going to ask that very question.

:)

Also, if Waterloo is anything to judge by, a much greater percentage of donations comes from/is directed toward the engineering and computer science programs. This is both from alumni donations and corporate donations; I imagine for many and varied reasons.

[con-girl.livejournal.com]

yes, most science students get stipends.

Most social science do not.

Most science grad students spend a large part of their time writing for grants that are independent of graduate work status (i.e. the professor's lab will be getting the funding, to do a particular project).