Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada Postdoctoral Fellowship

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Description

The Postdoctoral Fellowships (BP) Program provides support to a small number of highly promising researchers who are at a crossroads in their careers. Postdoctoral fellowships also aim to ensure a pool of highly qualified Canadians who possess cutting-edge science and research skills in order to make them available to industry, government and academic institutions.

Eligibility

To be eligible for a PO, you must, by the deadline of the year in which you submit your application:

• be a Canadian citizen, permanent resident of Canada or a person protected under subsection 95 (2) of the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act ;
• hold or plan to obtain a doctoral degree in one of the fields of research supported by NSERC.

What’s more…

• you can only apply for one master’s or doctoral scholarship or postdoctoral scholarship per academic year to NSERC, the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR) or the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC);
• you must not have received a PO (including a Banting Postdoctoral Fellowship) from NSERC, CIHR or SSHRC;
• you must have fulfilled all the requirements of your doctorate no more than two years before September 1 of the year in which you submit your application.

  Note  : This date should not be the graduation date or the convocation date shown on your transcript, but rather the date you completed all of your degree requirements, including the defense. successful completion of your thesis and submission of the corrected version thereof. If you have more than one doctorate, the most recent completion date of the doctorate will be used to determine your eligibility;

An exception to this rule will be made only in the following cases:

• if you have held relevant full-time employment for at least six months in industry or government (experience gained in academia or in hospitals, research institutions and other laboratories affiliated with an academic institution will not be not taken into consideration) after obtaining your doctoral degree, NSERC will extend this eligibility period to three years;
• if you completed a non-research-based clinical residency program after receiving your doctorate, NSERC will extend the eligibility period to three years;
• if, within two years of the date you completed your doctoral degree requirements, you have had to take a significant break in your career due to parental, medical or family responsibilities, NSERC will extend the eligibility period to three years ;
• If, within two years before or after the date on which you have completed the requirements for your doctorate, you become the primary caregiver for the child immediately after the birth or adoption of a child, NSERC will extend the period of ‘eligibility for six years;
• If the period within which you are eligible to apply has been extended, NSERC may ask you to provide additional information or supporting documents. Information or documents provided to NSERC will only be used by staff of the organization to determine your eligibility for the program. If you wish to inform the Review Committee of delays or circumstances that may have affected your performance or productivity, you can do so on the Special Circumstances page of the request.

Proposed places of validity

You can hold your BP at the following establishments:

• Canadian academic institutions;
• provincial research organizations in Canada;
• other research laboratories in Canada;
• research establishments abroad.

You cannot have your PO in Canadian federal government labs and industrial labs across the country.

NSERC encourages you to undertake research that can be done jointly with other Canadian organizations. The nature of the proposed collaboration must be acceptable to the host institution.

What’s more…

• You can only hold a BP abroad if you have obtained a doctoral degree from a Canadian institution.
• NSERC encourages PO holders to enrich their research experience by gaining experience in various research settings. You cannot hold your scholarship at the institution (or its hospitals, research establishments or other affiliated laboratories) where you received your doctoral degree. However, you can submit an exception request which will be taken into consideration by the selection committee. The request must be motivated by medical (eg, the need to be near a health facility), family (eg, career of spouse) or scientific (eg, need to be near a health facility) reasons. accessibility of specialized equipment), which can make a change of establishment extremely difficult. Even if your exception request is accepted, your work cannot be supervised by the same research director as for the doctorate. It is recommended that you suggest an alternate location of validity for your PO in case your exception request is not approved.
• You can only hold a BP with the same research director as at the doctorate, even if the latter changes research establishment.
• Having your PO abroad could affect your residency status in Canada. You can contact the relevant Canadian authorities or an appropriate expert for advice.

Presentation of requests

To apply, you must complete and submit Form 201 to which you will attach supporting documents, if necessary. For more details, please see the Instructions for Completing an Application – Form 201 .

Deadline

Your application must be received electronically by NSERC no later than October 17 at 8 p.m. ET. If the deadline falls on a weekend day, your application must be submitted the next business day by 8:00 p.m. ET. Incomplete applications will be rejected.

NSERC will not accept any changes or updates to your application after you submit it, except those regarding personal contact information. To do so, you must send an email to scholarships@nserc-crsng.gc.ca .

Assessment of applications and selection criteria

NSERC’s scholarship selection committees review all BP applications. They assess each application against the selection criteria described in the Guide for Selection Committees for Graduate Scholarship Programs – Doctoral and Postdoctoral . Note that NSERC can promote equity and diversity by giving priority in funding to people who have submitted a meritorious application and who have declared themselves Indigenous or women, if sufficient funds are available. Selection committees are organized according to the following main categories:

• Cellular and molecular biology
• Plant and animal biology
• Chemistry
• Evolution and ecology
• Chemical, Biomedical and Materials Science Engineering
• Civil and industrial engineering
• Electrical engineering
• Mechanical Engineering
• Geosciences
• Physics and astronomy
• Psychology
• Computer Science
• Mathematical Sciences

The Research Subject Code (see List of Research Subject Codes for Fellowships ) indicated in the application determines which Selection Committee will assess the application. NSERC may assign the request to another committee if it deems that the research topic is more suitable for it.

NSERC expects selection committee members to guard against unconscious biases they may have that may influence decision-making, whether these relate to a school of thought, to basic research as opposed to applied research, certain sub-disciplines, research areas or methods (including new ones), the size or reputation of an institution, the age, gender of the applicant or other personal factors.

NSERC is taking concrete measures in light of the observation that it is essential to create a more equitable, diverse and inclusive Canadian research system in order to foster excellent and innovative research that is likely to generate the necessary spin-offs for deepen knowledge and tackle challenges at the local, national and international levels. This is the principle underlying the commitments made in the Tri-Agency Statement on Equity, Diversity and Inclusion . For more information, please see the document on Equity, Diversity and Inclusion Considerations at Each Step of the Research Process .

When preparing your application, you should consult the Selection Criteria and Indicators section in Appendix B of the  Guide for Selection Committees for Graduate Scholarship Programs – Doctoral and Postdoctoral . It contains useful information on what committee members consider when reviewing applications. You should also read the Instructions for Making a Claim – Form 201 .

Applications are assessed and selected on the basis of the applicants’ ability to demonstrate that they possess the following skills:

• Research skills and potential (70%)
• Communication, leadership and interpersonal skills (30%)

Announcement of results

NSERC will notify you of the results of the competition in February. NSERC will not communicate decisions over the phone.

NSERC will post the names (and other general scholarship information) of award recipients on its website. For more information, see the Access to Information Act and Privacy Act document .

Terms of the scholarship

Please refer to the Tri-Agency Guide for Research Training Award Recipients for the policies and requirements to which awards are subject (e.g., acceptance, effective date, deferral, paid parental leave and the possibility of holding a part-time scholarship).