Without NSERC funding, which has always felt like a total shot in the dark given how low the number of awards is, I've had to spend so much time chasing funding term-by-term. It's been colossally stressful and time-consuming. I suppose it's made me a better grant writer and made me scrappy but my science has suffered immensely.
If graduate funding was CAD $35,000/yr for all students, how would that change your life? I would go to the dentist! And the optometrist! In the same year, even! I would buy vegetables and eat better. I would be able to do the things I enjoy on weekends and feel less like I've been sucked into a horrible vortex of stress and sadness. I would be looking for a postdoc instead of looking for a higher higher-paying job outside of academia because I wouldn't be so desperate for money. I'd have started the family I've always wanted instead of now risking a 'geriatric' pregnancy down the road.
Additional comments: Scientific research in Canada is stagnating - there are excellent minds that aren't being supported and we're driving away quality people that don't come from wealthy backgrounds. Our competitiveness as a nation is suffering alongside the students and postdocs who are squeezed between increasing tuition and the skyrocketing cost of living, which has been the case since long before the recent ballooning of inflation.
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