Non‑Canadian Applicants

Candidates for admission must have the equivalent of a Canadian undergraduate honours degree in philosophy. A letter giving full details of your training in philosophy should be sent to the Graduate Coordinator when you apply for graduate studies.

In order to receive a student visa to enter Canada, students may need to demonstrate to Canadian immigration authorities that they have the promise of sufficient funds to cover living expenses, tuition, and return travel. We normally offer financial assistance to all full-time graduate students who are without external aid, but this funding isn't sufficient to cover the considerable expenses foreign students would incur, and they must supplement this with other funding.
A further difficulty is that a good deal of the funding we have available comes from sources which allow grants to Canadian citizens and permanent residents; as a result, we are often unable to offer any financial aid to applicants from abroad. If you have the promise of sufficient funding from non-Dalhousie sources, such as a grant from your home country or your own funds, then these considerations will not be problems for you. If you apply here, you should send the Graduate Coordinator in the Philosophy Department a letter giving some idea of your prospects for external funding.

Another requirement for admission is fluency in English. If your first language is not English, we require a minimum TOEFL score of 600 (TOEFL PB), or 100 (TOEFL IBT), a score of 7.5 on the IELTS.

If foreign students applying here are unable to obtain the Canadian currency to cover the application fee, a letter to the Admissions Office sent with the application stating the difficulty may result in their waiving this requirement.