Alberta Innovates Graduate Student Scholarship

Alberta Innovates funding is available to successful applicants as full scholarships. Tri Council Scholarships (NSERC/CIHR and Vanier), China Scholarship Council and other external peer-reviewed award holders who win an Alberta Innovates GSS will receive a top-up for the duration of their eligibility, and this top up value may increase to the full scholarship value when the external funding ends, for the remainder of the Alberta Innovates scholarship terms, if applicable.

Master's full value: $26,000
PhD full value: $31,000
Top-up value: $12,000

Scholarship terms vary from one to four years, depending on the circumstances of the applicant.

Eligible applicant requirements:

• A minimum of 3.5 GPA is an eligibility requirement for all applicants. The GPA will be calculated based on the current graduate program graded course work at the University of Alberta, or, if a student is newly admitted, the AGPA will be used to determine eligibility.
• Students applying for a master's level Alberta Innovates GSS must have been admitted to their master's program no earlier than Spring 2021.
• Students applying for a doctoral level Alberta Innovates GSS must have been admitted to their doctoral program no earlier than Spring 2019. For students who transfer from a master's to a PhD program, the time spent in the master's program counts towards the time spent in the PhD.
• Students cannot receive more than a total of four years of combined Master's/doctoral Alberta Innovates Graduate Student Scholarship funding.
• There are no citizenship restrictions on this award.
• Areas of study and research must fall into the categories funded by Alberta Innovates: Information and Communications Technology (ICT) and Advanced Materials and Manufacturing Technologies (AMM). Further explanation of the eligible Emerging Technology Areas of Research can be found here.
• Each candidate must be sponsored by a faculty supervisor, possessing both a record of productive research within an Alberta Innovates-funded research area (ICT and AMM) and sufficient resources to ensure the satisfactory conduct of the research.
• For those not yet registered in a graduate program at UAlberta, your eligibility to apply for the Alberta Innovates GSS is contingent upon meeting all eligibility requirements for admission to a UAlberta graduate program. Applicants are to contact their prospective department for information on those requirements.
• Students cannot simultaneously hold support from more than one Alberta Innovates studentship program.
• A student cannot receive more than a total of four years of combined master’s/doctoral support from Alberta Innovates (across all programs). This includes support from the Alberta Innovates Graduate Student Scholarship, Alberta Innovates Graduate Student Scholarship for Data-Enabled Innovation, the Alberta Innovates Graduate Studentship (Health), and the Alberta SPOR SUPPORT Unit (AbSPORU) Graduate Studentships.

Additional details can be found in the 2022-23 Alberta Innovates GSS Program Guidelines and Handbook.

Effective 2022/23 competition year, Departments are no longer required to review applications and submit eligible nominees to FGSR. Rather, students must apply directly to FGSR via the GSMS Awards Portal.

Alberta Innovates Graduate Student Scholarship (AI GSS) Memo

A complete application includes:

1. Alberta Innovates Graduate Student Scholarship Application Form - for questions related to the content of each section, applicants are encouraged to seek advise from their supervisor(s) or department.

Students may also refer to the Tips & Tools for a Successful Scholarship Application located under Award Resources webpage.

2. Up-to-date Transcripts of the applicant's complete academic record (this includes all undergraduate and graduate studies, completed or ongoing). Up-to-date transcripts are defined as transcripts dated or issued in the fall session of the year of application (if currently registered) or after the last term completed (if not currently registered). Instructions below must also be followed:

a. Unofficial U of A transcript (can be obtain from BearTracks) that shows Fall 2022 registration.

 IMPORTANT: It is the applicant’s sole responsibility to submit all required transcripts. FGSR will NOT provide copies of transcripts (including foreign transcripts) to either departments or students.

3. Two Letters of Reference. These letters must be submitted by the referees via GSMS Awards Portal. Applicants are responsible for supplying their referees with the documents necessary for them to write their respective letters.

Applicants should contact their referees well in advance of the application deadline date. For each referee, applicants are required to enter the name and contact information and to set the required deadline date by which the assessments must be submitted through GSMS Awards Portal. GSMS will then send email requests to the referees providing them with a link that will allow your referee to complete their assessment online.

It is the applicant's responsibility to follow up with referees to ensure the assessments are submitted in sufficient time prior to the applicant’s deadline. Applicants will not be able to submit their application until the referees have submitted their assessment and this task is completed.

IMPORTANT: It is the student’s responsibility to ensure that their application package is complete in every respect before submitting to FGSR via GSMS Awards portal. Incomplete nominations, including those submitted with missing transcripts and missing signatures or pages, will not be considered.

Once the application is submitted to FGSR, NO revisions will be permitted.  FGSR will not follow up regarding applications that are incomplete and the application will automatically be deemed ineligible.

University of Alberta Review Procedure and Selection Criteria

FGSR will review all applications for eligibility and completeness and forward them to the Graduate Scholarship Committee (GSC) for adjudication. The GSC will evaluate the applicants based on excellence and strategic alignment in Emerging Technology Areas of scientific research which are strategically important to Alberta. These areas are: Information and Communications Technology (ICT) and Advanced Materials and Manufacturing Technologies (AMM) in and of themselves or which additionally support the innovation priority areas of Environment, Energy, Agriculture, Manufacturing, and Health.

Alberta Innovates Evaluation Process

Alberta Innovates will then review applications forwarded by the universities for alignment with Government of Alberta, Alberta Innovates, and Post-Secondary Investments and Emerging Technologies (PSIET) priorities. The applicant must clearly articulate in the application how the results of the research can produce potential environmental, health, economic, social and other impacts for Alberta.

Alberta Innovates retains the sole right to determine the evaluation process and does not disclose the names of its external reviewers to ensure their objectivity and impartiality. All external parties are subject to both confidentiality and conflict of interest policies set by Alberta Innovates.

Deadline for students to directly submit applications to FGSR through the GSMS Awards Portal is Wednesday, September 21, 2022 by 11:59 MDT/Edmonton Time.

Due to high volume of applications we expect to receive, we highly recommend students to submit their application a few days prior the deadline to avoid any technical issue. FGSR will NOT ACCEPT any late applications and no exceptions.

Students who have been awarded an Alberta Innovates Graduate Student Scholarship are required to submit their final report at the end of the funding term. The final report can be found in the student’s Alberta Innovates account.

For more information, complete eligibility and binding rules for holding Alberta Innovates GSS, please see the Alberta Innovates GSS Program Guidelines and Handbook, which can be found on Alberta Innovates website.