Ontario Trillium Scholarships (OTS) Program

Award Overview

​Value & Duration:	$40,000 (renewable for total of four years) ​
​Level of Study:	PhD​​​​
​​​Required Legal Status:	International (at ti​me of application)​

Purpose

The Ontario Trillium Scholarships (OTS) program is a provincially-funded initiative to attract the best-qualified international students to Ontario for PhD studies. Approximately 15 Trillium Scholarships for PhD students are awarded annually at the University of Toronto.

Eligibility

Nominees must:

• be an international student;
• be intending to pursue a full-time PhD program within the funded cohort;
• begin their program in September of an academic year;
• have achieved an A- average in each of the last two years of full-time study;
• not have completed more than one year of PhD studies prior to receipt of the OTS;
• not currently be studying at an Ontario institution; and
• ​ not concurrently hold a scholarship offered by any of the following agencies: Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC), the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council (NSERC), the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR), Ontario Graduate Scholarship (OGS), Queen Elizabeth II Graduate Scholarships in Science and Technology (QEII-GSST).

Recipients:

• must maintain an A- average, and be making satisfactory progress toward the completion of their degree as determined by their graduate unit in order to maintain the award;
• must register and remain registered as a full-time student (a change in status may result in suspension or termination of payments and/or returning funds already received); and
• transitioning to permanent residency status will continue to be eligible for the balance of their renewable OTS scholarship for a total of four years. Transitioning does not infringe upon OTS funding for recipients.

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Value & Duration

• The effective value to each student in 2015-2016 will be $40,000.00 total (including tuition). The OTS is held for four years, provided the student maintains in good academic standing and continues to meet recipient eligibility requirements.
• The program has been designed to be cost-shared with Ontario universities using a 2/3-to-1/3 government-to-institution ratio, similar to the OGS.
• The graduate unit will be responsible for cov​ering 1/3 of the cost of the Trillium Scholarship ($13,333.33), which may be provided to the recipient in the form of an award such as a University of Toronto Fellowship (UTF) or on-campus employment (e.g., teaching assistantships, research assistantships).

Applications & Deadline

​For the 2015-16 competition, applications are accepted only via nominations by the graduate units. Students interested in OTS are encouraged to contact their graduate unit when applying for admission to U of T. Application deadlines are set by the individual graduate units.

Contacts & Resources

For questions about the central administration of OTS, please contact the Provincial Awards Officer at staceym.kwan@utoronto.ca​​.​