The Canada Student Grants Program is managed by Human Resources and Skills Development Canada. Seven types of grants were offered by this program in 2009/2010 including grants for persons with permanent disabilities, grants for students with dependents, grants for low and middle income families and grants for part-time studies. The amount of the bursaries ranged from $200 a month to $8,000 for the academic year.
The provinces of Canada offer many of their own grants to post-secondary students of their province. In Ontario education bursaries are managed by the Ontario Ministry of Training, Colleges and Universities. Ontario grants for the 2009/2010 school year include: the Aird Scholarship awarded to students with disabilities; the Explore grant offered to students interested in learning a second language; the Distance Grants available to students commuting over 80 km to their post-secondary institution; and Access grants, which cover 25 to 50 percent of a students tuition costs if they are a member of a low income family. Lists of student grants and scholarships are available on most provincial websites.
Canadian students applying to graduate schools in Canada should also apply to graduate scholarships offered by the Social Science and Humanities Research Council, as well as provincial graduate scholarships. SSHRC scholarships for the 2009/2010 school year range in value from $6,000 to $17,500, and they are available to students enrolling or enrolled in Canadian Masters or Doctoral studies. An Ontario Graduate Scholarship is also available to Canadian graduate students attending an Ontario university.
Most university and college students spend their summers working, and some run their own businesses. Select provinces have funding available for students who want to start their own business. The Ontario Ministry of Economic Development and Trade offers up to $3,000 to students aged 15 to 29 to help them start and run a summer business in Ontario. Applicants must be a student returning to school in the fall, and those who win the award cannot work more than 12 hours a week at another job.
Many federal and provincial student grant applications are available online, and some may be submitted online as well. Your eligibility for a Canada Student Grant is considered automatically when you apply for a student loan through your province. For some grants such as the aboriginal student bursary available in Ontario, applicants must fill out a paper application which is available at their schools financial aid office. In general, applications will ask for basic personal information and supporting documentation including your social insurance number.
Many grants will also require transcripts with your latest marks and reference letters from teacher or professors. Graduate scholarship applications can be quite complex, and you are often asked to present a research plan. Student business grant applications typically ask for a business plan and bank information.
Grants are approved or denied by people who consider both quantitative and qualitative aspects of your application. Sometimes it is hard to explain why some students are awarded a grant and others are not; decisions and results can be especially complex for graduate students whose applications are sent to a review board of five to six professors with different backgrounds. In 2005 the Faculty of Graduate Studies at the University of Ontario made news when it accidentally posted the names, SIN numbers and Ontario Graduate Scholarship results on an unsecured webpage.
Many student grants are conditional, and they may be revoked if you no longer meet the requirements for which the grant was offered. Most grants last for a period of one year at which point you will have to apply again for future funding. Issuing false statements on your application or using scholarship funds for purposes that they were not intended may also result in the revocation of a student grant