Financial Support
A separate application for financial assistance is not required when applying to the PNB Graduate Program, as all applicants are automatically considered for financial support within the Department. All graduate students are supported by stipends from a combinations of external scholarships, departmental scholarships, research grants, training grants, and teaching assistantships. The minimum stipend for 2018-2019 is $22,226. Hamilton is affordable for students and thus the stipend affords a comfortable lifestyle.
- Psychology graduate students without external scholarship support receive a departmental scholarship; in 2018-2019 this is $13,500 for both M.Sc. students and Ph.D. students.
- During the years of their graduate training, students assist in the Department teaching activities. The nature of each student's contribution depends upon his or her other interests and the needs of the Department. Teaching Assistantships pay $8,726 per year (2018-19) and are available to all graduate students in our Department. The sum of department scholarship ($13,500) plus teaching assistantship ($8,726) provides the minimum stipend $22,226.
- Tuition Fees for Canadian citizens and Permanent Residents for one academic year (September to August) are $7,008.00 plus supplemental fees of $967.43 (2017-18). Fees for the 2018/19 academic year have yet to be determined and are subject to change. Using these estimates, we can estimate take-home = $14,251 before taxes.
- Scholarship funding is paid in 3 installments at the beginning of the Fall, Winter, and Spring/Summer terms. TA hours are paid biweekly through Fall and Winter terms.
- Tuition is due the first week of September, however students are not charged interest until a later date so that there is enough time to receive scholarship funding to pay tuition.
- SGS updates information on charges and payments about mid-July for September's new and returning students. Go to the SGS resources page and click on the Financial and Human Resources tab, and look for the relevant files which are displayed annoyingly as "tiles".
- In recent years, foreign students have been put on a similar financial footing with Canadian students, by virtue of their receiving either a supplementary departmental scholarship or a tuition differential waiver.
Students are strongly encouraged to apply to external granting agencies in the autumn before they intend to apply to the Department. Financial support from these agencies is substantially greater than can be offered by the Department. Canadian citizens or landed immigrants may apply to the Federal agencies: Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council (NSERC), Canadian Institutes of Health Sciences (CIHR), or Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC). Ontario residents may also apply to the Ontario Graduate Scholarship (OGS) program. Details of these and other assistance programs are available from your own University Graduate Office or from the McMaster University School of Graduate Studies scholarship page.
Graduate students are also eligible to receive financial support to attend scientific conferences. Please refer to PNB Graduate Travel for more details.
To view details about Tuition and Fees at McMaster, please visit SGS Tuition and Fees.
Additional Support
If you are having trouble making tuition and other scheduled payments, we refer you to a couple of websites that contain important information:
Dr. Dick Day often engages graduate students as examination invigilators. Email is sent to all graduate students when invigilators are needed.