university of toronto application help guide

8/8/2019 University of Toronto Application Help Guide

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Web-based Graduate AdmissionsGuide to Potential Applicants

Civil Engineering Department

University of TorontoTable of Contents

1 Overview 32 Visibility and Stages of Applications 3

3 The Steps Towards Admission 54 New Account Registration 7

5 The My Tasks Menu 86 Tasks for Everyone 8

6.1 Log out from the current session 86.2 Update my contact information and password 8

6.3 Review my important dates 81

7 Tasks for Applicants 87.1 Step one: Enter the basic information about yourself 8

7.2 Step two: Provide contact information of your referees 137.3 Step three: Entering grades 13


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7.4 View your application 157.5 Submit your application 16

7.6 Review the status of your submitted application 167.7 Delete your application 17

7.8 Remind referees to send letters of reference 177.9 View the list of faculty members in the department 177.10 View the list of research labs in the department 18

8 Acceptable Use Policy 199 Privacy Policy 1910 Contact Us 20

Web-based Graduate Admissions

Guide to Potential ApplicantsCivil Engineering DepartmentUniversity of Toronto

1 Overview

Thank you for considering to apply to the Department of Civil Engineering,University of Toronto, and welcome to the web-based graduate admissions website. The web-based graduate admissions system in the Department of CivilEngineering is carefully designed and implemented to streamline the process forpotential applicants, like you, to create and submit applications, as well as the

process for the faculty members to select and review them.The objective is to replace the paper-based work flow by electronically storing allthe information related to applications.Any new user who creates an account in the system automatically assumes therole of an applicant. After you have created your new account and logged in, youmay create a new application, continue to complete all the information requiredfor an application, and submit an application. Once your application has beensubmitted, you may check the status of the application on-line in the system.After a positive decision of admission is made, you will be promptly notified by anemail message, and directed to accept or decline the offer on-line in the web-based system. At any time, you may also view the profiles of all the faculty

members and research laboratories, and send reminders to referees.

*Important Note: This guide is specifically designed to help all potentialapplicants who intend to use the web-based graduate admissions system toapply to the Department of Civil Engineering, University of Toronto. As anapplicant, you are strongly encouraged to read this guide in its entirety. Importantnotes will be included in this guide, as well as helpful tips on how to best use the


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system. While every effort has been made to make the system as easy to use aspossible, it is the responsibility of the applicant to use the system appropriately.As the system is designed to streamline the admissions process, we believe thatit is worth the additional effort and time on your side.

2 Visibility and Stages of Applications

Throughout the lifetime of your application, it may go through the followingstages.1. Applications that are in preparation. Applications that have been started by youand partially entered into the system database are not visible to either the facultymembers, or the graduate administrators. They are only visible to you, whostarted the application, and who is in the process of completing such anapplication. When you are satisfied that all required information has been enteredinto the database, you may decide to submitthe application. After submission, anapplication may no longer be modified by you. At the time of submission, the

system performs sanity checks to make sure that all required information hasbeen entered, and that there does not exist obvious conflicts or mistakes. Afterpassing the sanity checks, an email message will be sent to you, and yourapplication is immediately visible to the graduate administrators, but not yet tothe faculty members for review.2. Applications that have been submitted, waiting for letters of reference to arrive.After your application has been submitted to the system and all sanity checkshave passed, the referees indicated by you in your application are immediatelyand automatically contacted by the system for the letters of reference. Theapplicant may also choose to use the system to remind referees via emailmessages. As soon as a letter of reference has been received, the

corresponding applicant and referee will be contacted via email messages toconfirm the receipt of such a letter. Two letters of reference are required for anapplication. An application will remain invisible to the faculty members for review,when the system is waiting for the letters of reference to arrive.3. Applications that are visible. After both letters of reference have been receivedby the system, your application becomes visible to the departmental faculty forreview. A faculty member can search and sort all visible applications using avariety of criteria, including GPA, country, name, visa status, and degrees. As itmay take time for referees to complete their letters of reference, it is stronglyadvised that you submit your application on-line as early as possible, preferablytwo weeks before the actual application deadline.

4. Applications that are visible, and the research interests of applicants andfaculty members match.Though faculty members can review all applications inthe system, not all applications can be acted upon. Each faculty member canspecify up to three research areas as his/her research interests in the profile.You can also specify up to three research areas as your research interests in theapplication. The system compares these two sets of research areas. If there existan overlappedarea, the faculty member is able to indicate his/her interest in the


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application, by either selecting the application for interview, or by making acommitment to provide funding to support the admission of your application.

Each application in the system is in one of the following stages.

1. Your application becomes visibleautomatically if both letters of reference havebeen received. As soon as your application becomes visible, an email messagewill be sent to you. Your application will be reviewed by the departmental facultyas soon as it becomes visible.2. Your application will be authenticatedby the graduate administrators if one ormore of the faculty members have specified interests in the application. A facultymember may select your application for a possible interview, or commit researchfunding to support the admission of your application.During the authentication process, at their discretion, the graduate administratorsmay check if you have paid the application fee, and compare the course gradessubmitted on-line by you to those in your original and official transcripts. The

graduate administrators may also choose to verify the authenticity of the letters ofreference by contacting your referees directly via email messagesor phone calls, or by using the official Web URL that you have provided.3. If your application is deemed authentic after the authentication process issuccessfully completed, it will enter the authenticated stage. After yourapplication is authenticated, an email message will be automatically sent to you,including the list of faculty members interested in the application.4. After a number of faculty members have committed research funding tosupport an application, the graduate administrator or the graduate admissionscommittee may decide to accept your application with an offer of admission, atwhich time your application enters the accepted stage.Only the graduate administrators or the graduate admissions committee have theauthority to make admission decisions. A faculty member does not have suchauthority.5. Upon receiving an offer, you may choose to respond with a positive ornegative response. In either case, your application is moved into the respondedstage. The faculty members who have committed funding to your application willbe notified of your decision via email messages. Your decision is also viewable inthe system, when your application is displayed. If your decision is positive,the name of the faculty member that you have selected as your supervisor is alsodisplayed.Each offer of admission is associated with a response deadline. If you do notrespond on-line before the response deadline expires, we assume that you havedeclined the offer and the offer is withdrawn.6. If no faculty members have expressed interest in your application, or if yourapplication does not meet the minimum admission standards, or for any otherreason that the graduate administrators the rejectedstage, at which time anappropriate email notice will be sent to you by the system.


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3 The Steps Towards Admission

The web-based graduate admissions system facilitates a list of steps towardsadmission of your application.Step 1.You are required to visit the web site of the School of Graduate Studies,University of Toronto. The current URL of this web site ishttps://apply.sgs.utoronto.ca. The purpose of the web site is tocollect basic information about your application, assign an SGS Application ID toyou, and collect the application fee of CAD $90.As you submit your applicant profile, the SGS website will prompt you to makearrangements for payment of the application fee. You may pay the applicationfee on-line or off-line. The fee is payable online by credit card, or off-line by creditcard, certified cheque or money order. Cheques and money ordersshould be made payable to the University of Toronto. If you pay off-line, you mustforward a hard copy of the Payment Form directly to the School of GraduateStudies.

Step 2 (Required paper documents to be submitted as part of yourapplication).Once the processin Step 1 is completed, your application will be entered into the official databasesystems of the University of Toronto. At this point, you are required to print onecopy of the Application for Admission that you receive at the SGS graduateapplications web site. Sign the application and forward the followingdirectly to the Civil Engineering Graduate Office:(1) Your signed Application for Admission form;(2) An unofficial paper copy of the English facility (e.g., TOEFL) score report (ifapplicable);(3) Arrange for official (hard copy) transcripts to be submitted to the Civil

Engineering Graduate office, for all postsecondary programs completed,attempted, or in progress. Transcripts must list the years of study,courses taken and grades received. In cases where the program was completed,the applicant must also provide proof of degree conferral. Applicants whoattend(ed) non-English speaking universities must have the universities provideofficial transcripts and proof of degree conferral in the original language,as well as in English. Universities must forward transcripts in sealed envelopesbearing the institutional stamp or signature across the back flap directly to theCivil Engineering Graduate Office.(4) Submit a request to ETS to arrange for official score reports to be forwardeddirectly to the School of Graduate Studies, University of Toronto. The institutional

code for the University of Toronto is 0982 the departmental code for CivilEngineering is 065.


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The mailing address for the Civil Engineering Graduate Office is:Department of Civil EngineeringAdmissions Committee35 St. George St. Rm. 105

Toronto, ONCanadaM5S 1A4

Once you have arranged all the above paper documents to be submitted to theCivil Graduate Office by surface mail, you may proceed to the Civil web-basedgraduate admissions site, with your SGS ApplicationID ready.

Step 3.You are required to visit the web-based graduate admissions site of theDepartment of Civil Engineering. The current URL of this web site is:https://gradapply.engineering.utoronto.ca/CIV/login.php (click on the link to visit

the web site directly) In this web site, you register for a new account, start anapplication on-line, and enter all the required information in the application. Thedata entry process is divided into three stages. The first stage collectsbasic information in your application. The second stage includes the contactinformation of two referees. The final stage requires you to enter all your rawcourse grades (including undergraduate and graduate courses, when applicable).Once all the required information has been entered in the systemand deemed correct, you may submit the application to the Department. Yourapplication is finalized immediately after submission, and cannot be furthermodified by anyone. Do not send email messages to the Civil Graduate Officeregarding modifying an application after submission, as even thegraduate administrators are not able to help you to modify your application.Step 4.After your application is submitted, you will receive an email ofconfirmation, and both of your referees will be immediately invited to submit aletter of reference. At any time after this confirmation, you may revisit the website to view the submitted application, to remind the referees, or to check thestatus of the application. Whenever a letter of reference has been uploaded, youwill be notified. Your corresponding email address may be changed at any time inthe system. Your application will be carefully reviewed by the departmentalfaculty after it is visible.Step 5.An email message will be sent to you when your application isauthenticated by the graduate administrator, with a list of faculty members whohave expressed interests (including interviews and funding commitments) in yourapplication.Step 6.After the application is authenticated, you are strongly encouraged tocontact the faculty members who are interested in your application for a selectioninterview. After possible interviews, funding commitments may be made by thefaculty members, and admission decisions will be made by the graduateadministrators.
https://gradapply.engineering.utoronto.ca/CIV/login.phphttps://gradapply.engineering.utoronto.ca/CIV/login.php


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Step 7.A email offer of admission will be sent to you when an application isaccepted by the graduate administrators, with a list of faculty members who havecommitted funding.Step 8.You are then presented an opportunity to respond, by a specificresponse deadline, to accept or decline the offer of admission. If you choose to

accept the offer, you should specify a faculty member as your thesis supervisor,selected from the list of faculty members who have committed funding.The response deadline is specified in the offer of admission. If the deadlineexpires and you have not responded, the offer is withdrawn as we believe youhave declined the offer. You may indicate your decision, including the selectionof your supervisor, directly in the on-line graduate admissions system.Step 9.If you have accepted the offer, the faculty member who you haveselected as your thesis supervisor will be notified with an email message of yourdecision. All other faculty members, if any, who have committed funding tosupport your application will also be informed with email messagesof your decision. The stage of your application moves forward to the final stage

responded after a decision is made on your side. A final email message willbe sent to you to welcome you to the department and to the University ofToronto.

4 New Account Registration

To register for a new account, you should click the Potential applicant? Pleaseregister link on the main page. You are then taken to the new accountregistration page, where you are required to enter some basic mandatoryinformation, such as your full name, email address, affiliation, and your contactphone number. To register, please fill out the form and click the Register button.

Your email address is used for all future communication with you, so pleasecarefully select an appropriate and reliable one. All the information entered in thisform may be changed in the future at any time after you log in.After successful registration, your initial account password will be generated andsent to the email address specified by you. Your initial password can be changedupon first login. If you have forgottten your password, enter your email addresswithout a password, and then click the Reset my password button on the mainpage. A new password will be generated and sent to you by email. Your existingpassword will not be retrieved, but instead will be overwritten by the newpassword generated by the system.Important note on the choice of web browsers. The current implementation of the

system supports three major web browsers: Internet Explorer 6, Safari, andMozilla Firefox. Though we do not officially support other minor browsers such asOpera and MyIE, we note that the browser that has been confirmed not to workcorrectly is Internet Explorer 7 Beta 2. Please do not use this browser as yourchoice. It is highly recommended that you use one of the three supported webbrowsers.


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5 The My Tasks Menu

Upon logging in, you are shown the My Tasks menu. The menu is tabbed. TheAs Everyone menu contains all the tasks that are available to any user of thesystem. The As Applicants menu contains all the tasks available only to theapplicants. For your security and protection, your login session will automaticallyexpire after 90 minutes of inactivity, and you are required to log in again. For thesecurity of the web site, all your activities in the system will be logged during yourlogin session. Important note: Do not use the Back and Refresh buttons in yourbrowser. They may lead to unpredictable results, since some of the query datamay be reposted to the system. Instead, use the My Tasks link at the top-rightcorner of the page to get to the My Tasks menu first, and then use the desiredfeature.

6 Tasks for Everyone6.1 Log out from the current session

You may use this task to log out from the system, and to terminate your currentactive session. You may also log out by using the Logout link at the top-rightcorner of each page.

6.2 Update my contact information and password

Your contact information and password in the web-based graduate admissionssystem may be updated in this task. It includes your full name, affiliation, contact

email address, contact phone number, and account password. If you choose tochange your email address, you will be required to log in using your new emailaddress the next time you try to log in.

6.3 Review my important dates

In this task, you may review all the important deadlines related to starting andsubmitting your application. These deadlines are strictly enforced by the system.Before the first day of starting an application, you will not be presented the tasksto start an application. Similarly, after the application deadline expires, thesystem will remove all the links for you to submit your application. Pleaseobserve these deadlines very carefully. No late submissions will be accepted.

7 Tasks for Applicants7.1 Step one: Enter the basic information about yourself

The process of entering your application is divided into three steps. In the firststep, basic information about yourself will be collected. In the second step, you


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will be asked to provide contact information of two references. In the final step,detailed information about your grades will be collected. Dependingon the complexity of your background, this process may take as long as a fewhours to complete. All the information collected in this process will be used toevaluate your application among other applicants, so we think it is worth the

additional time and efforts on your side. In this first step, you are required to entersome basic information about yourself and your background. Before you submityour application, you may come back later to continue the process and tomodify the existing information that you have entered. You are responsible toenter correct and accurate information in the process.Important Note: Please visit the on-line graduate admissions web site of theSchool of Graduate Studies (https://apply.sgs.utoronto.ca) before you proceed touse this feature to start entering information in your application. After youcomplete all the steps required at the School of Graduate Studies website, including the payment of the application fee, you will receive an SGSApplication ID. This ID will be required in the Civil on-line Graduate Admissions

system, in Part 1 of this step.

Part 1: Basic information about yourself.In this part, please enter the following information:1. SGS Application ID that you have obtained previously at the School ofGraduate Studies web site;2. Your gender;3. Your legal status in Canada;4. Whether or not you are a native English speaker. If you are a nonnativeEnglish speaker and you satisfy one of the following requirements (4.1/4.2/4.3),choose Native English Speaker.4.1. Nonnative speakers who hold degrees or diplomas from post-secondaryinstitutions in English-speaking countries (e.g., the United States, Canada,England, Ireland, Australia, New Zealand) and who have successfully completedat least a two-year course of study in which English was the language ofinstruction.4.2. Transfer students from institutions in the United States or Canada whoseacademic course work was favorably evaluated in relation to its demands andduration.4.3. Nonnative speakers who have taken the TOEFL test within the past twoyears and who have successfully pursued academic work at schools whereEnglish was the language of instruction in an English-speaking country for aspecified period of two years or longer.5. Your date of birth;6. Your country of citizenship;7. Your fax number (optional);8. Some urgent contact information to find you in an emergency, such as yourcell phone number or the contact information of your friend or relative (Note: thisis mandatory information);9. The degree program that you would like to apply for. In the Department of Civil


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Engineering, three graduate degree programs are offered. The Master ofEngineering degree is a course-only terminal degree, and does not include athesis. The Master of Applied Science degree is a regular Masters degree thatincludes a Masters thesis. The Doctor of Philosophy degree requires the Masterof Applied Science degree (which requires a thesis), or its equivalent in other

universities.10. The starting month of the program you seek to apply for. A September startimplies that you seek admission to the Fall 2007 term, while a January startimplies that you seek admission to the Winter 2008 term (This is only for M.Engapplicants.)11. You may optionally include information about any external financialscholarships that you have already applied for. For Example: NSERCscholarships for domestic applicants, and/or Ontario Graduate Scholarships(OGS).

Part 2: The research areas of your interests.

You are able to choose up to three research areas that match your researchinterests in your graduate studies. These research interests are used to decide ifa faculty member can act upon your application.A faculty member can express his/her interests in your application only whenthere exists an overlap between the research interests of you and the facultymember. Otherwise, the faculty member can view the application and makecomments, but cannot select your application for interviews, or commitfunding to support your application. You do not have to make a choice for all thethree research areas. You can leave the drop-down list in its state as (Chooseone), which will be shown to faculty members as unspecified. For each of theseresearch areas, an optional match priority level can be chosen:Best match for my research, Excellent match for my research, Good match formy research. If you do not wish to make this choice, No preferencescan alwaysbe chosen. The match priority levels may be used to signal strong interests inone or a few research areas. If you have authored or co-authored any researchpublications, you may enter the total number of your publications in this sectionas well. This field, however, is optional. If you wish to provide a detailedlist of your publications, you may provide them in your CV, which can beuploaded to the system in this stage, but completely optional.

Part 3: Your degrees and GPAs.In this part, for each of the degrees that you have earned in the past or you willearn soon, please enter the following information:1. The title of the degree (such as Bachelor of Engineering);2. The name of the department or degree program (such as Civil Engineering);3. The name of the university or college from which you have obtained thedegree (such as University of Toronto). You should first try to select from thedrop-down list of university names. If your university is not on the list, pleaseenter its official name in English in the text box;


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4. The enrollment and graduation dates. If you do not remember the day of themonth, just enter 1. These dates need to be consistent with your officialtranscripts;5. Your Grade Point Average (GPA), which is the weighted average of your rawcourse grades without any conversion, the weights are usually the course credits;

6. The maximum grade in the university. For example, it may be 20 (Iran) or 100(China). The maximum grade must be a positive number. Please enter 100 if thisdegree is a Bachelors degree from the University of Toronto, as we requirepercentage grades be entered for University of Toronto students.7. Information of the person responsible for issuing your transcript. This includeshis/her name, complete business mailing address, position, email address,business telephone number, and fax number. This information is used to verifythe authenticity of your transcript. All the information above is mandatory.Please note: If you have more than one degree, they should to be chronologicallyordered, and fitted into First degree, Second degree, Third degree, and Fourthdegree sections. If you have more than four degrees, please provide additional

degree information in your CV.Tips for computing GPAs in each of your degrees:1. Please use caution when computing your GPA. Your GPA may be checkedbefore we deem your application authentic.2. Please do not convert any of your raw course grades. Instead, you shouldcompute your GPA using the formula: SUM(grade * weight / maxGrade) /SUM(weight), while weight reflects credits you receive for the course, andmaxGrade reflects the maximum grade achievable for the course.3. For a particular course, if you receive both a letter grade and a numericalgrade on your official transcripts, please enter your numerical grade, and useyour numerical grade to compute your GPA.4. For a particular course, if you receive only a letter grade, please use thefollowing conversion table to convert the letter grade to a numerical grade:Letter Grade Numerical Grade Maximum GradeA+ 4.0- 4.0A 4.0 -4.0A- 3.7- 4.0B+ 3.3 -4.0B 3.0 -4.0B- 2.7 -4.0C+ 2.3 -4.0C 2.0 -4.0C- 1.7- 4.0D+ 1.3- 4.0D 1.0- 4.0D- 0.7- 4.0F 0.0 -4.0

Letter Grade,Numerical Grade, Maximum GradePass 1.0-1.0


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Fail 0.0-1.0

*If your transcripts are from CAIRO UNIVERSITY and do not have numerical orletter grades associated with your courses, please use the following chart.Distinction = A

Very Good = BGood = CPass = D

Part 4: Your standardized test scores (if applicable or available).If your language of instruction is not English or you are not a native Englishspeaker, you are required to provide your TOEFL and TWE score report. In thispart, you may provide your TOEFL, TWE, TSE, GRE, and GRE Subject testscores, if you have any. For foreign students whose language of instruction is notEnglish, only the TOEFL and TWE scores are required. The others are optional,but if you do choose to provide your scores here, please send unofficial

photocopies of your test score reports to the Civil EngineeringGraduate Office for authentication purposes. With respect to GRE General testscores, please enter the total score of all three sections, do not send us yourcopies of your GRE score.Important Note:Applicants should forward a paper copy of the TOEFL scorereport to the Civil Graduate Office, along with the Application for Admission. TheDepartment also requires that official score reports be forwarded directly fromETS to the School of Graduate Studies, University of Toronto. Theinstitutional code for the University of Toronto is 0982, the Departmental Code is065.

Part 5: Your Statement of Intent.In this part, you are asked to enter or modify your Statement of Intent in a textform, as plain text. Your Statement of Intent should not be longer than 1000words. You may use standard HTML tags , , to enter bold, italic andunderlined characters. Other HTML tags are not allowed. The words in thisStatement of Intent may be searched by faculty members reviewing yourapplication.Tip: The Statement of Intent is fully searchable by the faculty members reviewingyour application. If you are interested in one or a few faculty members, you mayinclude their names in the Statement of Intent, helping them to find you. You mayalso include your specific research interests in the Statement of Intent, includingimportant keywords, so that faculty members searching for the same key- wordsmay find you quickly. You may also wish to have your Statement of Intent readyoff-line in a separate text editor or word processor before you proceed to enterthem in this part, since the active session will automatically expire after 90minutes of inactivity.

Part 6: Your CV.


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This part is optional. You may upload your CV in this part as an Adobe PDFdocument, or replace it later with a new version. If you have additionalinformation that you wish to include in your application, such as copies ofprevious awards or research papers, you may also include them in your CV asadditional pages. You are, however, only allowed to upload one Adobe PDF

document. Important note: Please upload a CV document that conforms to theAdobe PDF standard. It is recommended that you use Adobe Distiller in Windowsor ps2pdf in UNIX to generate your final PDF submission. Please also make surethat the file size of your CV document is less than 4 MB.Tip: As it may be a time-consuming process, it is strongly advised that youprepare your Statement of Intent, your CV and calculate your GPAs off-line,before you start to enter any information in this step. This is because that thesystem will time out after 90 minutes of inactivity. If you take too long, yourisk losing the data you have entered when the system logs you outautomatically. When you click the Update my application button, the informationyou have entered will be checked for correctness and completeness. If there are

problems, they will be marked and pointed out in red letters. You are advised toenter accurate information for all the mandatory fields. If sanity checks arenot passed, your information will not be stored in the system. After you havecompleted this step and before you submit your application, you may alwayscome back and modify the information that you have entered.

7.2 Step two: Provide contact information of your referees

The second step collects the contact information of your referees. It may only bestarted after you have finished entering information in the first step. However, anytime before submitting the application, you may revisit the first step to modify any

information you have entered. For both referees, you are required provide theirfirst and last name, email address, title, affiliation and phone number. The emailaddress will be used to contact the referee for a letter of reference. The phonenumber may be used to contact the referee as well. Please note that refereeemail addresses should not be freely available email addresses, such asgmail.com or hotmail.com. The system will check the email address against a listof free email domains. Please note that the affiliation of a referee should alsoinclude the department or group that the referee is affiliated with.For each of your referees, it is highly recommended, though optional, that youalso provide the URL of a web site that verifies the authenticity of the refereesaffiliation and email address. It can be the referees official public web page, the

official public web page of the department or group that the referee is affiliated to,or a web URL linking to a research paper or public document, that verifies theaffiliation and email address of the referee. You may use Google or MSN Livesearch tools to assist you. This information is helpful in authenticating thereference letter provided by the referee.

7.3 Step three: Entering grades


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The final step for entering an application may be the most time-consuming one.In this step, you are asked to provide detailed information about your coursegrades. You do not have to complete this step all at once. If you so choose, youcan save the grades you have entered so far at any time and come back later to

complete the process.You can enter three types of grades:1. Percentage grades (e.g., Grade = 91, Max Grade = 100; or Grade = 17.5, MaxGrade = 20).2. Grade point values (e.g., Grade = 3.3, Max Grade = 4.0).3. Letter grades: A, B, C, D, pass, fail (e.g., Grade = B+, Max Grade = A+; orGrade = pass, Max Grade = pass). All letter grades will be automaticallytranslated into grade point values ranging from 0 to 4.0 based on University ofToronto standards, shown in the previous table in Section 7.1. You should onlyenter letter grades if you have not received any percentage grades (numericalgrades) in your official transcripts for the course.

To enter your course grades, you first select a degree using the drop-down listnext to the label Degree. If you have only specified one degree in Step 1, therewill not be a drop-down list.You then select a semester or term, by using the drop-down list next to the labelSemester or term: If you cannot find an exact match to your transcripts, find thebest match possible.Then you proceed to specify the year of that semester or term, and specify theyear (as in 2001) in the text box next to the label Year: Finally, you enter all thecourses you have taken in the year, semester/term, and degree you havespecified.At any time, you can click the Update my grades button to save the currentgrades that you have entered. You can also change the degree, semester/termand year specification, and then click the Retrieve my grades button, to retrievethe grades that you have entered for that particular degree, semester/term andyear. All the grades that you have entered are viewable in the My Tasks - AsApplicants - View my application task.Tip:If you first click the button Update my grades without entering any courses,but after you have specified the degree, semester/term and year information, themaximum grade column will be automatically filled with the maximum grade thatyou have specified in Step 1 for that particular degree.

Important notes about entering grades (please read in entirety):1.Regardless of the type of grades you enter, it is mandatory that you enter theraw grades from your official transcripts. You do not perform any gradeconversions yourself. Similarly, the course titles should be identical to the onesshown in your transcripts. It is strongly advised that you have a copy of yourtranscripts ready before you start to enter grades. If you have entered incorrectinformation when compared to your official transcripts, including missing courses,incorrect grades and incorrect course titles, it may have a significantly negativeimpact on the authenticity of your application.


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2. You have to enter grades for all the courses on your transcripts for all thedegrees that you have earned or expected to earn, before you may officiallysubmit your application on-line. If a course is in progress and you do not have agrade yet, enter the letter I (as in In progress), and the maximum grade for thatcourse. If you fail to include all the courses, or if you enter grades that are in-

consistent with your official transcripts, it may significantly affect the integrity andoutcome of your application.3. When entering your courses, you need to enter the title of the course asshown in the English translation of your transcripts, the amount of credits/weights(or equivalent) for that course, your grade obtained in the course, and themaximum grade for that course.4.Special note to applicants with University of Toronto undergraduate degrees:University of Toronto transcripts provide two raw grades for each course: apercentage grade out of 100 and a letter grade out of 4.0. You are required to (1)enter percentage grades in Step 3; (2) enter 100 as the maximum grade in Step1, and (3) enter the corresponding GPA out of 100.

5. Applicants must provide official (hard copy) transcripts for all post-secondaryprograms completed, attempted, or in progress. Transcripts must list the years ofstudy, courses taken and grades received. In cases where the program wascompleted, the applicant must also provide proof of degree conferral.Applicants who attend(ed) non-English speaking universities must have theuniversities provide official transcripts and proof of degree conferral in the originallanguage, as well as in English. Universities must forward transcripts in sealedenvelopes bearing the institutional stamp or signature across the back flapdirectly to the Civil Graduate Office:

Department of Civil EngineeringAdmissions Committee35 St. George St., Rm. 105Toronto, ONCanadaM5S 1A4

The Civil Graduate Office will contact university registrars to verify theauthenticity of all academicdocuments.

7.4 View your application

In the task View my application, you are able to view all the information you haveentered so far as part of your application. In addition to the traditional web-basedviewing, you can click on the linkYou can also download a printer friendly version of your application by clickinghere. at the top of the page to download a printer-friendly Adobe PDF document.This document includes all the information you have entered in a standard


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format, the same format that the faculty members may download and print aswell.Please note:If your CV is in a non-standard PDF format that does not conform tothe Adobe PDF standard, you may not be able to download a printer friendlyversion of your application from the system. This is due to the possibility that the

system may fail to merge your CV to the end of the generated application PDF. Ifyou fail to download a printer-friendly PDF document, please considerresubmitting a CV document that conforms to the Adobe PDF standard.Tip:If you discovered that the printer-friendly version of your application (or yourCV) that you have just downloaded does not reflect your most recent changes,you may need to clear the cache of your Internet browser, and then try again.

7.5 Submit your application

You use the task Submit my application to submit your application. Before thesubmission proceeds, the system automatically performs a series of sanity

checks on the data you have entered. If there are problems, the system willexplain the problems to you in a warning text box, and will not allow you toproceed with the submission. For example, if you are not a native Englishspeaker, and you do not provide TOEFL scores, the system does not allow youto proceed. As another example, if the calculated GPA from your raw coursegrades does not match the GPA you have entered in Step 1, you will not beallowed to proceed. If all sanity checks are passed, you will be brought to thesubmission page, where your basic contact information, including your name,email address, affiliation and phone number, will be displayed. You will bepresented a button labeled Submit my application. Once you click this button,there will be no more confirmation pages asking you to confirm. Your application

will be submitted and finalized, and you will no longer be able to modify theapplication. You may still view your application at any time.Important note: Always proofread your application before final submission. Makesure all details are included. It is a good idea to print the printer-friendly PDFdocument that the system has generated, and read from the printout. Be cautiousbefore you submit.As soon as your application has been submitted, email messages will be sent toboth of your referees to invite them to submit a letter of reference. As they maytake some time to write the letter of reference, it is highly recommended that yousubmit your application at least two weeks before the applicationdeadline.

7.6 Review the status of your submitted application

You may use this task to review the status of your application at any time after ithas been submitted. Initially, the system is waiting for the letters of referencefrom the referees. Whenever a letter of reference has been submitted, you will benotified by email. As soon as the application reaches a new stage, includingvisible, authenticated, accepted, or rejected, this page will reflect the new stage


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with a descriptive message, and the content of a recent email message sent toyou, which may include more details, such as a list of faculty members.After you have reached the accepted stage, you will need to use this task toaccept or decline your offer of admission, before the response deadline expires.In the page, the email offer of admission that has been sent to you will be

displayed, after a brief congratulatory message. Below the content of theemail message, you are presented with a drop-down list of the names of facultymembers, from which you are responsible to choose one as your thesissupervisor, should you decide to accept the offer. If you decide to accept theoffer, click the button labeled I accept this admission offer. Otherwise, clickthe button I decline the admission offer. If you decline the offer, a confirmationdialog box will be displayed, with the question Do you wish to decline the offer?,and two choices, Cancel and OK. If you choose Cancel, you will be brought backto the page. Otherwise, you have successfully declined the offer. After you haveresponded to an offer of admission, your decision will be shown when you checkthe status of your application again using this task. The content of the

confirmation email message will also be shown in the same page. If you havechosen to accept the offer, the name of your intended thesis supervisor is shownas well.

7.7 Delete your application

If all of the following conditions hold, the Delete my application link will appear inthe As Applicants section of the My Tasks menu.1.The important date of starting an application has passed;2. The first step, Enter the basic information about myself, has beensuccessfully completed with all the required information;

3. The application has not been submitted yet.This feature helps you to delete all the information you have entered in yourapplication so far from the system. If you choose to use this feature, theinformation you have entered will be deleted permanently from the system. Afterdeleting your application, you may start a new application again by going throughthe three steps.Please use caution when using this feature. You will be asked to confirm youraction twice, once in a confirmation web page, and the second time in a dialog.

7.8 Remind referees to send letters of reference

In this task, you are presented with the list of referees, along with their emailaddresses, who have still not submitted a letter of reference in support for yourapplication. You are presented with an opportunity to do any of the following.1. Click the name of the referee. As soon as you click the name of a referee, thesystem will automatically send an email reminder to remind the referee to submita letter of reference. The email reminder is generated and sent by the system.


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2. Click the email address of the referee. In this case, use your favorite emailclient to write your own email message to remind the referee.

7.9 View the list of faculty members in the department

You may use this task to view a list of all the faculty members in the department.The name, email address, link to a personal web page, and the research groupof a faculty member is shown in the list.With this list, you may perform any of the following tasks:1. You may click the external link labeled URL to directly visit the personal webpage of a faculty member.2. You may click the email address of a faculty member to compose an emailmessage.3. You may click the name of a faculty member to view his/her profile in the web-based graduate admissions system.

The profile of a faculty member in the system includes the following pieces ofinformation.1. Research group. A faculty member is primarily affiliated with one of the nineresearch groups in the department. This information is displayed to you in theprofile, but not used anywhere else in the system.2. Research areas. A faculty member can choose up to three research areasthat match his/her research interests. These research interests are used todecide if a faculty member can act upon an application, such as yours. A facultymember can express his/her interests in an application only when there exists anoverlap between the research interests of the applicant and the faculty member.Otherwise, the faculty member can view the application and make comments.

The faculty member does not have to make a choice for all the three researchareas. He/she can leave the drop-down list in its state as (Choose one), whichwill be shown to you as unspecified. For each of these research areas, anoptional match priority level can be chosen:Best match for my research, Excellent match for my research, Good match formy research.If one does not wish to make this choice, No preferencescan always be chosen.These priority levels are not used in the system.8.Web page.This is presented to you as a hyperlink to the personal web pageof the faculty member. The web page URL is optional for the faculty member tospecify. If left blank, this field will not be shown to you.

9.Office location. The office location of the faculty member. It is optional, and ifleft blank, the field will not be shown to you.10. Cell phone number for urgent contact.This is an optional field for thefaculty member to enter an alternative phone number if he/she prefers to becontacted in urgent situations by the applicants.If left blank, the field will not be shown to you.


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11.Description of my research.A faculty member can, optionally, enter a fewparagraphs to describe his/her research interests. The description is optional,and if not entered, the field will not be shown to you.A faculty member is able to update his/her profile in the system at any time. Ifyou are interested in a particular faculty member, you may check again after a

period of time to see if there is any additional information made available inhis/her profile.

7.10 View the list of research labs in the department

A research laboratory (or research lab) represents a group of faculty membersin the department that are willing to accept students without making a decision onwho may be the thesis supervisor in the research lab. Usually, such a decision ismade after the applicant has started the degree program. In some cases, co-supervision by more than one faculty member in the research lab is a possibilityas well.

In this feature, you may view the profiles of all such research labs. In eachresearch lab, you may be able to view its name, the primary research group inCivil Engineering that it belongs to, the research areas that it is interested in, thefaculty members that belong to the research lab, as well as a description of itsresearch interests.

8 Acceptable Use Policy

By submitting data to and using the services of the Web-based GraduateAdmissions system, you agree to the following:You agree to read the corresponding Guides in the Online Help section of the

system, before proceeding to use the system.If you are an applicant seeking admission, you agree to be responsible for thecorrectness and accuracy of all the information you have provided in yourapplication, and use every caution to ensure that such information that you willsubmit or have submitted in the system corresponds to its officialsources, such as original transcripts available from the university. You agree tobe responsible for the authenticity of the contact information of all your referees,and do not engage in activities leading to fraudulent evaluation results and/or theletters of reference from the referees.You perform all the tasks in this system manually, and do not use automatedservices and software to use the services and links throughout this web site. You

do not use any mechanisms or tools to circumvent security and access controlprotections to obtain unauthorized access to any data, information, documents orservices in this system. You do not engage or participate in the use of automatedrobots to abuse the system of new account registration. You do not engage orparticipate in any Denial of Service attacks with the purpose of interfering withnormal operations of the system.The system keeps extensive logistics of normal activities, including your IPaddress. If you are found to have violated this Acceptable Use Policy, at any


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time, either in the process of making admission decisions or after the decisionsare made, you will be deemed unacceptable to the University of Toronto,and actions will be taken to reject your application, withdraw the offer ofadmission that may have sent to you, or expel you from the graduate program ifyou have already enrolled in such a program at the University of Toronto.

If you do not agree to this Acceptable Use Policy, you are advised not to proceedto use the system further.

9 Privacy Policy

In the Web-based Graduate Admissions system that you are currently using, westrive to develop innovative services to better serve our users, including potentialapplicants, referees, faculty members and graduate administrators. Werecognize that privacy is an important issue, so we design and operateour services with the protection of your privacy in mind. This Privacy Policy

outlines the types of personal information we gather when you use our services,as well as some of the steps we take to safeguard it.The following principles apply to the personally identifying information we ask forand that you provide. Personally identifying information is information thatindividually identifies you, such as your name, phone number, and emailaddress.Data collectionDue to the nature of our services, we require you to register for an account. Weask you for some personal information in order to create an account (includingyour name, email address and a password for your account), and we will use thatinformation to provide the service. If you decide to apply for graduate admissions

by submitting an application, we collect more detailed personal information suchas your educational background and course grades.CookiesUpon your first visit to our system, a cookie is sent to your computer that uniquelyidentifies your browser. A cookie is a small file containing a string of charactersthat is sent to your computer when you visit a website. We only use cookies totrack the identifier of the active session that you are engaging, and do not usecookies to track any usage trends or personal information. Most browsers areinitially set up to accept cookies. You can reset your browser to refuse all cookiesor to indicate when a cookie is being sent. However, our system will not befunctional unless you start to accept cookies from this web site.

Information sharing and accessUnder any circumstances, we do not rent or sell your personally identifyinginformation to other companies or individuals. Your referees do not have accessto any information you have provided in your application, with the exception ofyour name and email address. Only the graduate administrators and facultymembers in the Department of Civil Engineering, University of Toronto,have access to the application that you have submitted, as well as the letters ofreference that your referees have submitted. If you do not choose to submit your


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application, the information that you have provided will not be accessible by thegraduate administrators and faculty members. If you prefer to delete all theinformation in your application without submitting the application, you may do soby using the Delete my application feature available to you.Information security

We make every effort to take appropriate security measures to protect againstunauthorized access to or unauthorized alteration, disclosure or destruction ofdata. We take advantage of the state-of-the art web and server-side technologiesfor this purpose. If you have any additional questions, please feel free to contactus any time by using the information available in the Contact Us section at thebottom of each page.

10 Contact Us

If you still have questions after you have carefully read this document, you maycontact us at the following email addresses:

[email protected] technical questions about any outages or technical problems, such as theapplication not accepting your SGS # etc. in the on-line graduate admissionssystem, or anywhere in the web server with the URLhttps://gradapply.engineering.utoronto.ca, should be sent to this email address(all non-technical questions that are not related to the web site will beignored, if sent to this address)

[email protected] other inquiries related to Civil Engineering Graduate Admissions should be

directed to this email address.

Important note: Please note that any questions that you have about the Schoolof Graduate Studies web site (https://apply.sgs.utoronto.ca) should be sent to thecontact addresses in the School of Graduate Studies application. Technicalproblems in the SGS web site are beyond our control.Good luck in your graduate application!

1 This document is last updated on May 29th, 2007.
mailto:[email protected]:[email protected]

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