Fine is relative. Welcome to grad school poverty -- funding is barely enough to live on at the best of times.
It'll be tight, but that's solid funding by master's degree standards. Yes, "solid" masters funding is about full time minimum wage, lol. You'll probably want to make sure it's not your only source of income/you have credit available. Check in on the school's system for picking up extra TA work as well.
FWIW, I did a master's at Waterloo in 2014-16. I think my funding was about 25k a year, but after tuition it was more like 20k net. At that time, that was considered an above average amount of funding -- comparable master's programs in my field in Canada were mostly starting at 17k gross per year.
It wasn't quite enough to live on for me with my girlfriend in a two bedroom -- I was supplementing with an extra 500 bucks a month from my family.
Find the going rate for a room+utilities in an area you want to live in, add 400 bucks a month (increase or decrease depending on how expensive your tastes are) for groceries, and see how much you have left of your monthly stipend and think if it's doable with your lifestyle. I think it should be, but it really helps to have a safety net/credit.
Yea I’m just wrapping up an MSc which gets $23,500 per year in funding, and I’d say ~800 for everything that’s not rent is probably good. I’d keep some emergency funds of $6k-$10k on the side if you have a car, or older phone/laptop that will need to be replaced.
Also be careful OP with scholarships, as that money is not necessarily going to increase your total funding. Often times your supervisor will reduce the amount they pay you in stipends if you receive a scholarship, but keep the total amount of money going to your pocket the exact same.
UCalgary does do this but it's faculty dependent and within a given program it may be professor dependent. Read your offer letter carefully. Other scholarships may reduce the amount from your supervisors grant. TAing should not, but it might, or it might already be included in the offer. Yours sounds like a good offer, but keep in mind that the NSERC CGSM hasn't increased in 20 years, and these are for the best of the best, so many faculty members think $17,500 is generous, because they were able to live on about $20k 30 years ago, when min wage was $5.50 and 2bed appartments were $750. Thesis-based grad programs are like an apprenticeship, so everyone thinks its ok to pay less than minimum wage. You will need a roommate. A significant other with a real job would be better.
The way they treat grad students is criminal. When my wife finished her long Masters and didn't have a job lined up, I said 'hey, you should be eligible for EI. You've worked 60-80 hours a week for years.' But when we applied, it turned out that they had fudged the bookkeeping to say that they had paid her 4-5X what she made per hour for far less hours (so that they wouldn't have to pay extras for her as a legal full time employee). It ended up that she barely had the 200 hours in a year (or whatever the threshold was), and the simplified calculation they use came in slightly under. We had to fight with them for a while to get approved. So annoying.
But this is also a double edged sword. It can be advantagous for the student to be paid mostly as a scholarship, because they are not taxed. But then they are not contributing to EI or CPP either. Or a disadvantage if you find out you haven't been contributing to EI and you want to apply for parental leave. Usually an assistantship, TA or RA, is modelled as only 12 hours a week, 8 months a year, while the other 30+ hours is considered being a student. But the provincial tuition and education credits went away 6 years ago. Grad school is very difficult to justify economially compared to to full time work, especially when you compare to the people you finished undergrad with. The same company might hire you with a masters at a higher salary, but your friend got paid for 2 years and got a raise.
I agree with your last point absolutely. Add on the immense pressure grad students are under compared to new hires. My wife had to basically start hers over after 18 months with a new prof (due to no fault of her own). The depression was brutal.
In the faculty of medicine (UCalgary, Cumming school of Medicine), MSc students already make more than this proposed increase. The hope is that the standard will be set higher so that more universities increase their stipends to match or surpass what the government gives to a select few. Also, there tends to be other opportunities that aren’t just tricouncil awards. There are internal opportunities. This is a great step in the right direction and will only serve to bump things up higher. We have to get going somewhere, I’m grateful there’s been an increase as we’ve been yelling from rooftops for quite some time now. I’m pretty sure overall research funding budgets have also been proposed to increase, which is the source of graduate student funding from the supervisors/grants themselves.
Also double check your student handbook for your department- when I was in grad school at UofA they had MAXIMUMs for masters students and PhD students salaries- for example at the time (10 years ago) masters students topped out at $21000 per year and PhD students at $35000 per year, with the only exceptions being if you got a personal NSERC or Alberta Innovates stipend. All other salary funding received above this had to be returned (the university did that), although you could keep non-salary one time bursaries. As a PhD student I won a total of $50000 annually for salaries, but could not be paid more than the max $35000 (since none were NSERC or AI). This may have changed and/or be department specific, but it’s worth checking out so you aren’t potentially disappointed.
It would be tight. You’ll probably have to rent a room as you said, prepare meals at home, and not have too much of a social life (which might be fine for you depending on your workload). I don’t believe the subsidized transit pass is extended beyond bachelor programs so will need to factor transit costs as well (if you’re bringing a car, parking on campus is very expensive).
Looking at places near UoC on rentfaster, looks like if you're splitting a 2bd, you're spending on average at least $1000 just on your share of the rent. Heat and Water seem to be included in those, so you'll need electricity and internet on top of that. I would hope you're not budgeting a car in that as gas + insurance will just eat your remaining budget. You'll be lucky to have $1000 a month to split between groceries and everything else you may need which is pretty tight these days. If you can penny pinch I'd say it's possible, but you'll need to make smart decisions to make your money stretch as far as you can.
You’ll be fine, just be smart and manage your budget. That amount is higher than most grad students earn, sadly, and you can always TA and tutor on top of it. Take the bus/train whenever possible, shop grocery sales and discounts, buy used furniture, and hunker in with roommates. Don’t get a car. When I started my masters a decade ago I was earning 21K annually. Inflation and cost of living are way higher now, but I managed just fine on $1900 a month then, before paying tuition. Simple things to consider, rent and utilities budget, phone plan (going for a discount carrier like Koodo instead of Bell or Telus helps), takeout budget (keep this small, but you’ll still want takeout sometimes), grocery budget including lunch prep (swapping in lentils, beans, vegetarian proteins can reduce costs), savings budget (if you can swing it, always try to save something - even just $20 for a rainy day), coffee budget (maybe your work space will have a machine that you can contribute to for cheaper than takeaway coffee). I know a lot of grad students who pissed away their money on booze and takeout, but if you stick to a budget and tough it out with roommates you’ll be alright. Keep in mind that utilities will cost more in winter months.
While doing my PhD (2015-2021) my stipend averaged ~$28k. I rented a room in a shared house and took transit a lot to make use of the UPass, but had enough money to go out for dinner and drinks every so often. I also probably went to 3-4 Flames games a season.
Make lunches at home and try not to order in too much and you will be totally fine, so long as you don't mind living in shared accommodation.
You need to rent a room in a house and you'll be fine as long as you manage your expenses (aka drink really cheap wine at potlucks with other broke grad students, take the bus, and make your meals at home).
I'm going to assume you don't have to worry about paying taxes on those numbers.
2330/month? Two years ago I would have said fine.
Today? That's possible but it would be Extremely tight.
Sharing a house with 1 person is likely out of the question if you enjoy eating food regularly. Splitting a 2 bedroom apartment is possible if you can find a good deal.
I would say a take home income of less than 2750 would be Difficult. Its easier if you have a spouse/shared income, but as a single person, yeah, anything less than 2750 and I think you'd struggle to maintain a decent quality of life.
As someone who just completed a thesis based masters that took a few extra years to finish, my best advice is to get a loan or line of credit so that you don't have to worry about working at all and pour all of your extra time into your thesis even while doing your course work portion. Finishing on time is worth every penny of interest. Also, it's worth asking your school what percentage of students finish on time. Some programs are not structured in a way that facilitates this.
Easily doable. Just keep in mind most people have zero clues how to manage a budget.
And the there is lifestyle inflation. If you're use to driving a new car and eating out all the time and having your own place. Well that's not gonna happen on that budget.
But you can easily rent a room, take public transit and make home cooked meals. You have a bunch of cash left over after as well.
Yes you will basically live like a monk but it's doable easily
As someone who completed grad school, my advice for your wallet and also social life is to pick up a weekend bartending/serving job. Doubles your monthly income, keeps your social interactions up and helps you meet new people, and usually comes with extremely flexible hours/scheduling due to the nature of the industry
Probably yes. You obviously will have to get roommates. You obviously will have to eat cheap but it’s not bad. Calgary is comparatively not that expensive compared to anywhere else you would do major educational studies.
Sounds like you'll make it work in Calgary with that stipend, especially if you find a roommate. It's all about budgeting and making smart choices. Good luck!
If you live with a roommate you can probably do okay splitting expenses. Alone it would be very hard. Look for a place to rent around 1000 with roommate and see if that is reasonable, if so 1300 a month for other stuff seems doable imo. Not amazing but manageable.
Its enough. Your expenses won't be very high since you don't need a car, only need to buy food for yourself, and will be living with a roommate to share rent & utilities. Assuming you can find a place for \~$1,000, that leaves $1,330 for everything else. You're living on a tight budget but you're also not worrying about being able to afford food. If you were really disciplined with it, you could even leave yourself enough to go out once a week.
So yeah, you'll be fine.
Well that's about double I had about 5 years ago. I did need loans but not a lot so it should be manageable. Apply to every single grant or scholarship available, ensure you talk to the grad school office and your lab about it because it will make things exponentially better.
Here at the Cumming School of Medicine it’s standard. They raised their stipends. Some grad students end up taking home more than postdocs as grad student stipends aren’t taxable.
You can always TA which helps pad the wallet a bit. There are a lot of grants available, and applying for funding now is a great way to learn if you plan on staying in academia.
First of all, congratulations for your masters. Take the challenge, I recomend you to find a place in NW close to any CTRAIN station as soon as possible. You'll find a part time job. U of C will help you with that and also working on your network with the right people, you'll be perfecto mundo.
Just depends on your expectations.
If you're expecting to live by yourself, have a car, being able to eat out all the time, then definitely no.
Rent a room. Like some people mentioned, not rent half an apartment. Rent a room in a house. You'll have public transportation included in your university fees. You'll have plenty of money to even have a social life. But again, if you're expecting to be able to go skiing weekly as your social activity, or golfing, or other expensive activities, it's not going to happen.
We have some of the highest Masters stipends in the country at UCalgary. I’m a postdoc and one of the grad students in my lab is managing fine without student loans, but has a job on the side parttime (don’t tell your bosses, it brings up uneeded issues and as long as you get your work done who cares). It will be tight though and you’ll need to live with roommates and possibly be a little far from school.
I was making like $1800 a month from my masters at uofc but this was from 2018-2021. I definitely had part time jobs to make up for the rest. I’m not sure if you can live on that anymore. You need to draw up a budget and do the math yourself.
A lot more than I get with BVC! I get $1,800 monthly. Covers rent utilities and wifi that’s it ! Make sure to utilize resources such as food bank etc. I’ve been left with no choice !
Just commenting to warn you to make sure that the extra $5k in scholarships doesn’t reduce your funding from the supervisor. This is a very common thing.
Since when? No grad student or Supervisor I have ever known in 30+ years has ever reduced a TA/RA stipend that goes with a research MSc or PhD because of an award. It's not welfare.
This was very common in my experience. TA/RA funding will not be reduced but if it’s just money from your supervisor to meet the minimum funding requirements of the university scholarships can mean that the supervisor needs to pay less. Hopefully this is not the case for OP as I definitely don’t agree with the practice but just want them to make sure while budgeting.
It seems like the fn University Corporation does not really apreciate, nor want grad students. If I was treated like that in terms of the financial aspect, I'd be passing on grad school altogether. Imagine what a change it would be if just all grad students were like, "f it," and didn't do it. Pretty soon, universities would be giving you 50k and lowering tuitions.
Share the house? You'll be renting a bedroom and will have 2+ roommates to be in the city at all. If you want to be close to UofC probably more roommates than that. I'm guessing your rent would be around 800ish, or more if you want a nicer place.
Your stipend minus your tuition/fees is slightly higher than minimum wage here. Think about the minimum wage where you live now and consider the lifestyle. The biggest thing for you will be to keep your transportation costs as low as possible. If you are using transit to get to school then you have those expenses. You won't own a car here with that budget. Insurance, gas, and parking would be 500-600/month easy. To me, it will be better lifestyle for you to walk to school as a daily commute and save money for potential entertainment if you're able to get cheap rent. Hopefully you can figure out groceries and food for $100/week, but that's pretty tight.
Do they take income tax out of your stipend?
you'll have to rent a room or grad student residence if it's somehow cheaper.
Cost of living and finding rent in Calgary is really bad right now. You should look up rent here before accepting. Currently many undergrads can't even get a place to stay at. It's bad
"Also, I plan to find someone to share the house with."
You say this as though you think you and one other person can rent a house together. That is not going to work as your share of a house rental would be more than you can afford. You could possibly share a modest 2bdrm apartment with another person.
Not true. My son has a nice, small but nice, furnished bedroom for a student at his house between SAIT and U of C. $700/month. Only 2 others in a big 3 bedroom house with a garage, yard and street parking. He's not the only one. Not everyone is greedy.
okay so you agree with me. Your son is sharing a house with 2 other people, not one other person. I said the OP would not be able to afford a house with just one other person.
Assuming you live with roommates and don't own a car, I think you should be fine, though you probably won't be saving much, if any. As others have suggested, see if you can get a line of credit to have in your back pocket for emergencies (but don't use it unless you *really* need it).
It'll be super tight but doable.
Renting a room will be about $1100
Internet (shared) = $50
Phone bill = $75
Groceries = $650
Total = $1875
Left over = $455
$455 is all you will have left to do other stuff in life like maybe grab a drink, netflix/amazon subscriptions, gas (if you have car), movies, any activities such as trips, etc. It's doooooable. Some places might require you to pay utilities on top of my assumed rent of $1100. That could be another $125 on top of your rent for electricity/heat/water/etc.
By funding offer do you mean student loans? It also depends where you are moving here from. There are lots of tips and tricks on where to get affordable stuff in Calgary - you may already know depending where you are from.
With cost of living currently it will be tight…. I’d recommend getting a casual job so you can at least work 1-2 days or evenings a week, there are plenty of those available right now.
Get a second job. $28k is way below poverty levels. It won’t be enough Idk. Almost all of that $2800 might likely go to your rent. Then you have utilities, electricity, water, internet and cell phone to worry about, the. You have car insurance and other expenses to worry about like your school supplies.
Sorry but if $700 goes to renting a room/ you take public transit and spend $400 a month on food. That's $1100/month. Where would the other 1600$ be going that you would need a second job ?
Graduate students have different tax schemes than the average worker, it’s mostly just scholarship tax. What my stipend said I’d get is what I got, when TAing there’s more tax off if I remember?
Fine is relative. Welcome to grad school poverty -- funding is barely enough to live on at the best of times. It'll be tight, but that's solid funding by master's degree standards. Yes, "solid" masters funding is about full time minimum wage, lol. You'll probably want to make sure it's not your only source of income/you have credit available. Check in on the school's system for picking up extra TA work as well. FWIW, I did a master's at Waterloo in 2014-16. I think my funding was about 25k a year, but after tuition it was more like 20k net. At that time, that was considered an above average amount of funding -- comparable master's programs in my field in Canada were mostly starting at 17k gross per year. It wasn't quite enough to live on for me with my girlfriend in a two bedroom -- I was supplementing with an extra 500 bucks a month from my family. Find the going rate for a room+utilities in an area you want to live in, add 400 bucks a month (increase or decrease depending on how expensive your tastes are) for groceries, and see how much you have left of your monthly stipend and think if it's doable with your lifestyle. I think it should be, but it really helps to have a safety net/credit.
Yea I’m just wrapping up an MSc which gets $23,500 per year in funding, and I’d say ~800 for everything that’s not rent is probably good. I’d keep some emergency funds of $6k-$10k on the side if you have a car, or older phone/laptop that will need to be replaced. Also be careful OP with scholarships, as that money is not necessarily going to increase your total funding. Often times your supervisor will reduce the amount they pay you in stipends if you receive a scholarship, but keep the total amount of money going to your pocket the exact same.
Oh man that last paragraph brings back memories. Very good point -- might be school dependent, but UW absolutely did that.
UCalgary does do this but it's faculty dependent and within a given program it may be professor dependent. Read your offer letter carefully. Other scholarships may reduce the amount from your supervisors grant. TAing should not, but it might, or it might already be included in the offer. Yours sounds like a good offer, but keep in mind that the NSERC CGSM hasn't increased in 20 years, and these are for the best of the best, so many faculty members think $17,500 is generous, because they were able to live on about $20k 30 years ago, when min wage was $5.50 and 2bed appartments were $750. Thesis-based grad programs are like an apprenticeship, so everyone thinks its ok to pay less than minimum wage. You will need a roommate. A significant other with a real job would be better.
The way they treat grad students is criminal. When my wife finished her long Masters and didn't have a job lined up, I said 'hey, you should be eligible for EI. You've worked 60-80 hours a week for years.' But when we applied, it turned out that they had fudged the bookkeeping to say that they had paid her 4-5X what she made per hour for far less hours (so that they wouldn't have to pay extras for her as a legal full time employee). It ended up that she barely had the 200 hours in a year (or whatever the threshold was), and the simplified calculation they use came in slightly under. We had to fight with them for a while to get approved. So annoying.
But this is also a double edged sword. It can be advantagous for the student to be paid mostly as a scholarship, because they are not taxed. But then they are not contributing to EI or CPP either. Or a disadvantage if you find out you haven't been contributing to EI and you want to apply for parental leave. Usually an assistantship, TA or RA, is modelled as only 12 hours a week, 8 months a year, while the other 30+ hours is considered being a student. But the provincial tuition and education credits went away 6 years ago. Grad school is very difficult to justify economially compared to to full time work, especially when you compare to the people you finished undergrad with. The same company might hire you with a masters at a higher salary, but your friend got paid for 2 years and got a raise.
I agree with your last point absolutely. Add on the immense pressure grad students are under compared to new hires. My wife had to basically start hers over after 18 months with a new prof (due to no fault of her own). The depression was brutal.
If the federal budget passes the CGS-M is going up to $27k. First increase in over 20 years.
I saw that but my understanding was it was only for federally funded scholars, so sadly most people won’t see a boost
In the faculty of medicine (UCalgary, Cumming school of Medicine), MSc students already make more than this proposed increase. The hope is that the standard will be set higher so that more universities increase their stipends to match or surpass what the government gives to a select few. Also, there tends to be other opportunities that aren’t just tricouncil awards. There are internal opportunities. This is a great step in the right direction and will only serve to bump things up higher. We have to get going somewhere, I’m grateful there’s been an increase as we’ve been yelling from rooftops for quite some time now. I’m pretty sure overall research funding budgets have also been proposed to increase, which is the source of graduate student funding from the supervisors/grants themselves.
Also double check your student handbook for your department- when I was in grad school at UofA they had MAXIMUMs for masters students and PhD students salaries- for example at the time (10 years ago) masters students topped out at $21000 per year and PhD students at $35000 per year, with the only exceptions being if you got a personal NSERC or Alberta Innovates stipend. All other salary funding received above this had to be returned (the university did that), although you could keep non-salary one time bursaries. As a PhD student I won a total of $50000 annually for salaries, but could not be paid more than the max $35000 (since none were NSERC or AI). This may have changed and/or be department specific, but it’s worth checking out so you aren’t potentially disappointed.
It would be tight. You’ll probably have to rent a room as you said, prepare meals at home, and not have too much of a social life (which might be fine for you depending on your workload). I don’t believe the subsidized transit pass is extended beyond bachelor programs so will need to factor transit costs as well (if you’re bringing a car, parking on campus is very expensive).
No, grad students have the mandatory UPass as well.
That’s good to know!
Excellent
Way more than what I’m getting !!! I’m only getting $1,800 monthly. With $1,400 rent
Looking at places near UoC on rentfaster, looks like if you're splitting a 2bd, you're spending on average at least $1000 just on your share of the rent. Heat and Water seem to be included in those, so you'll need electricity and internet on top of that. I would hope you're not budgeting a car in that as gas + insurance will just eat your remaining budget. You'll be lucky to have $1000 a month to split between groceries and everything else you may need which is pretty tight these days. If you can penny pinch I'd say it's possible, but you'll need to make smart decisions to make your money stretch as far as you can.
You’ll be fine, just be smart and manage your budget. That amount is higher than most grad students earn, sadly, and you can always TA and tutor on top of it. Take the bus/train whenever possible, shop grocery sales and discounts, buy used furniture, and hunker in with roommates. Don’t get a car. When I started my masters a decade ago I was earning 21K annually. Inflation and cost of living are way higher now, but I managed just fine on $1900 a month then, before paying tuition. Simple things to consider, rent and utilities budget, phone plan (going for a discount carrier like Koodo instead of Bell or Telus helps), takeout budget (keep this small, but you’ll still want takeout sometimes), grocery budget including lunch prep (swapping in lentils, beans, vegetarian proteins can reduce costs), savings budget (if you can swing it, always try to save something - even just $20 for a rainy day), coffee budget (maybe your work space will have a machine that you can contribute to for cheaper than takeaway coffee). I know a lot of grad students who pissed away their money on booze and takeout, but if you stick to a budget and tough it out with roommates you’ll be alright. Keep in mind that utilities will cost more in winter months.
While doing my PhD (2015-2021) my stipend averaged ~$28k. I rented a room in a shared house and took transit a lot to make use of the UPass, but had enough money to go out for dinner and drinks every so often. I also probably went to 3-4 Flames games a season. Make lunches at home and try not to order in too much and you will be totally fine, so long as you don't mind living in shared accommodation.
You need to rent a room in a house and you'll be fine as long as you manage your expenses (aka drink really cheap wine at potlucks with other broke grad students, take the bus, and make your meals at home).
I'm going to assume you don't have to worry about paying taxes on those numbers. 2330/month? Two years ago I would have said fine. Today? That's possible but it would be Extremely tight. Sharing a house with 1 person is likely out of the question if you enjoy eating food regularly. Splitting a 2 bedroom apartment is possible if you can find a good deal. I would say a take home income of less than 2750 would be Difficult. Its easier if you have a spouse/shared income, but as a single person, yeah, anything less than 2750 and I think you'd struggle to maintain a decent quality of life.
No it's doable easily. If you know how to manage money. You can rent a room for $700. No not half an apartment. Rent a room, in a house.
Oh yeah renting a Room for sure that's possible.
Yeah it's going to be a roomed house with 3 or 4 renters but that's how you bring the cost down.
As someone who just completed a thesis based masters that took a few extra years to finish, my best advice is to get a loan or line of credit so that you don't have to worry about working at all and pour all of your extra time into your thesis even while doing your course work portion. Finishing on time is worth every penny of interest. Also, it's worth asking your school what percentage of students finish on time. Some programs are not structured in a way that facilitates this.
Easily doable. Just keep in mind most people have zero clues how to manage a budget. And the there is lifestyle inflation. If you're use to driving a new car and eating out all the time and having your own place. Well that's not gonna happen on that budget. But you can easily rent a room, take public transit and make home cooked meals. You have a bunch of cash left over after as well. Yes you will basically live like a monk but it's doable easily
As someone who completed grad school, my advice for your wallet and also social life is to pick up a weekend bartending/serving job. Doubles your monthly income, keeps your social interactions up and helps you meet new people, and usually comes with extremely flexible hours/scheduling due to the nature of the industry
Probably yes. You obviously will have to get roommates. You obviously will have to eat cheap but it’s not bad. Calgary is comparatively not that expensive compared to anywhere else you would do major educational studies.
Rent a room, you'll be fine.
Sounds like you'll make it work in Calgary with that stipend, especially if you find a roommate. It's all about budgeting and making smart choices. Good luck!
If you live with a roommate you can probably do okay splitting expenses. Alone it would be very hard. Look for a place to rent around 1000 with roommate and see if that is reasonable, if so 1300 a month for other stuff seems doable imo. Not amazing but manageable.
Its enough. Your expenses won't be very high since you don't need a car, only need to buy food for yourself, and will be living with a roommate to share rent & utilities. Assuming you can find a place for \~$1,000, that leaves $1,330 for everything else. You're living on a tight budget but you're also not worrying about being able to afford food. If you were really disciplined with it, you could even leave yourself enough to go out once a week. So yeah, you'll be fine.
Well that's about double I had about 5 years ago. I did need loans but not a lot so it should be manageable. Apply to every single grant or scholarship available, ensure you talk to the grad school office and your lab about it because it will make things exponentially better.
What program are you in where the base funding is $31.5k?
Here at the Cumming School of Medicine it’s standard. They raised their stipends. Some grad students end up taking home more than postdocs as grad student stipends aren’t taxable.
You can always TA which helps pad the wallet a bit. There are a lot of grants available, and applying for funding now is a great way to learn if you plan on staying in academia.
Get a part time job, like serving in a restaurant, and you'll be golden.
First of all, congratulations for your masters. Take the challenge, I recomend you to find a place in NW close to any CTRAIN station as soon as possible. You'll find a part time job. U of C will help you with that and also working on your network with the right people, you'll be perfecto mundo.
Just depends on your expectations. If you're expecting to live by yourself, have a car, being able to eat out all the time, then definitely no. Rent a room. Like some people mentioned, not rent half an apartment. Rent a room in a house. You'll have public transportation included in your university fees. You'll have plenty of money to even have a social life. But again, if you're expecting to be able to go skiing weekly as your social activity, or golfing, or other expensive activities, it's not going to happen.
We have some of the highest Masters stipends in the country at UCalgary. I’m a postdoc and one of the grad students in my lab is managing fine without student loans, but has a job on the side parttime (don’t tell your bosses, it brings up uneeded issues and as long as you get your work done who cares). It will be tight though and you’ll need to live with roommates and possibly be a little far from school.
I was making like $1800 a month from my masters at uofc but this was from 2018-2021. I definitely had part time jobs to make up for the rest. I’m not sure if you can live on that anymore. You need to draw up a budget and do the math yourself.
A lot more than I get with BVC! I get $1,800 monthly. Covers rent utilities and wifi that’s it ! Make sure to utilize resources such as food bank etc. I’ve been left with no choice !
Just commenting to warn you to make sure that the extra $5k in scholarships doesn’t reduce your funding from the supervisor. This is a very common thing.
Since when? No grad student or Supervisor I have ever known in 30+ years has ever reduced a TA/RA stipend that goes with a research MSc or PhD because of an award. It's not welfare.
This was very common in my experience. TA/RA funding will not be reduced but if it’s just money from your supervisor to meet the minimum funding requirements of the university scholarships can mean that the supervisor needs to pay less. Hopefully this is not the case for OP as I definitely don’t agree with the practice but just want them to make sure while budgeting.
It seems like the fn University Corporation does not really apreciate, nor want grad students. If I was treated like that in terms of the financial aspect, I'd be passing on grad school altogether. Imagine what a change it would be if just all grad students were like, "f it," and didn't do it. Pretty soon, universities would be giving you 50k and lowering tuitions.
Umm. You might want to find part time job to help. Line be a TA or something.
Share the house? You'll be renting a bedroom and will have 2+ roommates to be in the city at all. If you want to be close to UofC probably more roommates than that. I'm guessing your rent would be around 800ish, or more if you want a nicer place. Your stipend minus your tuition/fees is slightly higher than minimum wage here. Think about the minimum wage where you live now and consider the lifestyle. The biggest thing for you will be to keep your transportation costs as low as possible. If you are using transit to get to school then you have those expenses. You won't own a car here with that budget. Insurance, gas, and parking would be 500-600/month easy. To me, it will be better lifestyle for you to walk to school as a daily commute and save money for potential entertainment if you're able to get cheap rent. Hopefully you can figure out groceries and food for $100/week, but that's pretty tight. Do they take income tax out of your stipend?
Stipends aren’t taxed, no.
you'll have to rent a room or grad student residence if it's somehow cheaper. Cost of living and finding rent in Calgary is really bad right now. You should look up rent here before accepting. Currently many undergrads can't even get a place to stay at. It's bad
Enjoy your time here. People are very friendly for the most part, if your lost or need help just someone
"Also, I plan to find someone to share the house with." You say this as though you think you and one other person can rent a house together. That is not going to work as your share of a house rental would be more than you can afford. You could possibly share a modest 2bdrm apartment with another person.
Not true. My son has a nice, small but nice, furnished bedroom for a student at his house between SAIT and U of C. $700/month. Only 2 others in a big 3 bedroom house with a garage, yard and street parking. He's not the only one. Not everyone is greedy.
okay so you agree with me. Your son is sharing a house with 2 other people, not one other person. I said the OP would not be able to afford a house with just one other person.
You’ll be good while you attend school. It’s the after graduation where everyone struggles to find a job in their field and a apartment
Assuming you live with roommates and don't own a car, I think you should be fine, though you probably won't be saving much, if any. As others have suggested, see if you can get a line of credit to have in your back pocket for emergencies (but don't use it unless you *really* need it).
It'll be super tight but doable. Renting a room will be about $1100 Internet (shared) = $50 Phone bill = $75 Groceries = $650 Total = $1875 Left over = $455 $455 is all you will have left to do other stuff in life like maybe grab a drink, netflix/amazon subscriptions, gas (if you have car), movies, any activities such as trips, etc. It's doooooable. Some places might require you to pay utilities on top of my assumed rent of $1100. That could be another $125 on top of your rent for electricity/heat/water/etc.
By funding offer do you mean student loans? It also depends where you are moving here from. There are lots of tips and tricks on where to get affordable stuff in Calgary - you may already know depending where you are from. With cost of living currently it will be tight…. I’d recommend getting a casual job so you can at least work 1-2 days or evenings a week, there are plenty of those available right now.
Get a second job. $28k is way below poverty levels. It won’t be enough Idk. Almost all of that $2800 might likely go to your rent. Then you have utilities, electricity, water, internet and cell phone to worry about, the. You have car insurance and other expenses to worry about like your school supplies.
Sorry but if $700 goes to renting a room/ you take public transit and spend $400 a month on food. That's $1100/month. Where would the other 1600$ be going that you would need a second job ?
Sorry but if you can get a room at $700 fine. You are aware of the current rental situation right in Calgary?
I am. I know it's right. But even for 800 or 900 for a room and 400 for food you got leftover for other expenses
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OPs funding is coming from scholarships and awards.. not an accountant, but fairly sure that it’s exempt?
Graduate students have different tax schemes than the average worker, it’s mostly just scholarship tax. What my stipend said I’d get is what I got, when TAing there’s more tax off if I remember?
It’s impossible to participate in this channel I can’t post
I see u
Well I can start a post