Award information
What are these awards for?
Undergraduate Student Research Awards (USRA) are meant to stimulate your interest in research in the natural sciences and engineering. They are also meant to encourage you to undertake graduate studies and pursue a research career in these fields. If you would like to gain research work experience that complements your studies in an academic setting, these awards can provide you with financial support through your host university. NSERC encourages qualified Black and Indigenous students to apply to this program.
Important Details:
- Great experience if interested in applying to Graduate School
- Paid to work full-time in a laboratory on campus. Students are not permitted to take courses during working hours. (1 course is permitted after hours.)
- Students can hold the award in Spring 2025, Fall 2025, or Winter 2026. Biology ranks all applications for the above terms annually in February.
- You will need a supervisor before you apply.
- The Biology deadline for this application is Friday, February 7th 2025 at 8:30am. Applications will be available online in December.
- Applications open to Canadian Citizens and Permanent Residents.
- You can hold the award after your last term at UW, but you must be registered as a student in the term immediately before holding the USRA.
Application Process:
- Find a supervisor and confirm that they are willing to endorse your application.
- Complete the NSERC USRA Application (available in December). If you applied in a previous year, you will have to change your previous application to this year's competition rather than completing a new application. Your supervisor will have to complete a new Form 202.
Please note: The email address on the USRA application form 202 part 1 must be the student’s @uwaterloo.ca institutional email.
- Complete the Biology Department Applicant Statement form online.
- Confirm that your potential supervisor completes the Supervisor Applicant Endorsement by the deadline.
Application, Applicant Statement, & Supervisor Endorsement Due Date: Friday February 7, 2025 at 8:30am
Biology Rankings
Biology supports supervisors submitting only one application each award year. Students should contact any supervisors they are interested in working with to create the best chances of being put forward.
The Biology Graduate committee will rank candidates primarily based on academic grades, with some preference for upper-year students, and on accepting students from a broad range of backgrounds to reflect Biology's diversity.
The Biology Department would like to cultivate interested and qualified candidates for these awards who plan to join the Biology Graduate program after their Undergraduate Degree has been completed.
Transcripts
You can copy your transcript from Quest, paste it to a Word document then save it as a PDF to upload with your application. Because our deadlines are before Fall grades are finalized, it is acceptable to submit a transcript with Spring as the last term showing grades. We may use Quest to pull Fall grades if more are finalized before reviewing the applications.
If, while ranking, students averages are equal, we will review the most recent transcripts available on Quest for updated marks.
Award History
In the 2024/25 competition we received a total of 7 awards that were held in the Spring 2024 term.
In the 2023/24 competition we received a total of 6 awards that were held in the Spring 2023 term.
In the 2022/23 competition we received a total of 6 awards that were held in the Spring 2022 term.
In the 2021/22 competition we received a total of 7 awards that were held in the Spring 2021 term.
In the 2020/21 competition we received a total of 7 awards that were held in the Spring 2020, Fall 2020 terms.
In the 2019/20 competition we received a total of 7 awards that were held in the Spring 2019, Fall 2019 terms.
In the 2018/19 competition we received a total of 6 awards that were held in the Spring 2018 term.
In the 2017/18 competition we received a total of 6 awards that were held in the Spring 2017, Fall 2017, and Winter 2018 terms.
In the 2016/17 competition we received a total of 7 awards that were held in the Spring 2016 and Fall 2016 terms.
For More Information:
Students can find more information on the NSERC website.
Contact April Wettig (awettig @ uwaterloo.ca) in the Biology Grad Office with any questions.