SSHRC Talent Award

Departments should set an internal application deadline several weeks before the nomination deadline to gauge interest from their department's students and determine the department's one doctoral and one postdoctoral nominee for which the department will prepare the required nomination materials noted below.

Note to graduate programs: UBC can nominate one applicant to the national stage of the competition.  One Talent Award is awarded annually by SSHRC from the nominations submitted by Canadian universities.  Departments should therefore nominate applicants who they believe will be competitive with the top nominees Canada-wide.

Each graduate program or academic department may forward a maximum of one doctoral nomination and one postdoctoral nomination. Complete nomination packages must be received by the Faculty of Graduate and Postdoctoral Studies by 4:00 pm PT on 23 February 2024.

For each nomination package, the following components must be included. Please see the Application Instructions on the SSHRC website ​for detailed instructions on preparing items #2-7 below.

1. SSHRC Talent Award nomination form - document prepared by nominating department
2. ‘Institutional nomination process’ (one page maximum) - document prepared by nominating department
3. ‘Institutional nomination letter and rationale’ (three pages maximum) - document prepared by nominating department
4. ‘Information supporting the nomination’ (two pages maximum, optional) - document prepared by nominating department
5. ‘Career interruptions and special circumstances’ (one page maximum, optional) - document prepared by nominee
6. SSHRC CV and consent forms (required for nominee only, “team members” not applicable) - documents prepared by nominee
   • SSHRC CV
   • Consent to Disclosure of Personal Information form
   • Consent to Disclosure of Nomination Content for Promotional Purposes form
7. Letters of support from three referees (two pages maximum each) - coordinated by nominee

Equity, diversity and inclusion: SSHRC indicates that achieving a more equitable, diverse and inclusive Canadian research enterprise is essential to creating the excellent, innovative and impactful research necessary to advance knowledge and understanding, and to respond to local, national and global challenges.  Departments crafting nomination materials, and referees writing letters of support, are encouraged to review SSHRC's information on limiting unconscious bias.

Presentation standards: All free-from documents (except letters), must be presented in portrait orientation; start on a new page; and use 12-point Times New Roman or comparable font.

Signatures required: On consent forms and the letters of support.  Electronic signatures are acceptable.

Submitting Nominations

Electronic documents must be presentable copies (ideally PDFs generated from source files, rather than scans). Nomination packages should be uploaded as a single PDF file to the graduate program’s UBC SharePoint folder (named FACULTY CODE - DEPT CODE).  Please have the nomination documents arranged in the order they are listed above.

The naming convention to be used for electronic files is: 'SSHRC-TALENT_PROGRAM_LastName_FirstName'. For example, an application file for Elizabeth Smith from PSYC would be called 'SSHRC-TALENT_PSYC_Smith_Elizabeth'.