Note that this is a living document and we are working to get all the information pieces from our information spreadsheet included here shortly.
There are three main astronomy units within the Toronto astrophysics landscape, the department, the Dunlap Institute and CITA.
The Department of Astronomy and Astrophysics is the host institute where all astronomy students are located (note that some CITA students have Physics as their home institution). DADDAA is actively engaged in a wide range of observational and theoretical research and offers Master of Science and Doctor of Philosophy degrees, as well as a wide range of graduate and undergraduate courses. Together with our CITA and Dunlap, there are close to 100 faculty members across the units and many post-doctoral fellows and graduate students, that make up a lively and diverse atmosphere in research, teaching and outreach.
The calendar of events within DADDAA is on the astro website.
The Dunlap Institute for Astronomy and Astrophysics at the University of Toronto is an astronomical research centre located within the Astronomy Building (AB). The institute was founded in 2008 with the help of endowed gifts to the University of Toronto from David M. Dunlap and J. Moffat Dunlap, using the proceeds from the sale of the David Dunlap Observatory. The focus of the Dunlap Institude is to design and build innovative technology like telescopes, spectrographs, and supercomputers to pursue ground-breaking astronomical research. There is also a focus on providing world-class training to students, and a mandate for science and astronomy outreach to engage the public across the Greater Toronto Area and beyond.
More information on the Dunlap Institute is available on the calendar.
The University of Toronto hosts the Canadian Institute for Theoretical Astrophysics (CITA) on the 13th, 14th, and 15th floors of the McLennan Physical Laboratories (MP), just next door to the AB. More broadly, the CITA Inc network connects faculty, postdocs, and students working in theoretical astrophysics across Canada and internationally.
CITA is a nationally supported research center for studies in theoretical astrophysics including the origin and evolution of the universe, and the many other phenomena revealed by modern astronomy. CITA’s primary missions are to foster interaction within the Canadian astrophysics community and to serve as an international centre of excellence for theoretical studies in astrophysics. CITA supports both National Postdoctoral Fellowships and Postdoctoral and Research Associate Fellowships, and CITA faculty advise students from both the Physics and Astronomy departments at UofT. CITA also fosters interactions through workshops and a vibrant visitor program.
You can find more information about CITA on their website.
In particular, the CITA Events Calendar has up-to-date information about seminar speakers, group meetings, arXiv coffee discussions, and other activities. Everyone is welcome! Many CITA events are announced on Dunlap mailing lists, but if you would also like to subscribe to CITA mailing lists, please contact CITA computing support (requests@cita.utoronto.ca).
A list of CITA Inc members is available here. Faculty members interested in joining CITA Inc should contact the CITA Director (director@cita.utoronto.ca).
For information on how CITA can support a meeting or workshop you're organizing, see the application procedure. CITA supports meetings of all sizes, from small workshops to major conferences.
The main directory for the Department is hosted on the departmental webpage. To find actual office numbers, use the search page here.
Sign up through Alice Chow.
Zoom & Overleaf
Users who have Zoom Pro accounts or Overleaf accounts are entitled to use the accounts for 3 more months after their Dunlap memberships expire. The system administrators will initiate the inactivation of account process after that. It is advised that users should arrange the file transfer before the end of the three-month grace period. Exceptions can be made if there are any special needs. Users can submit the request with justifications directly to the Business and Financial Manager for extension of their access for 3 more months.
Astro @ UofT Slack Workspace
Users who have Slack accounts on Astro @ UofT are entitled to use the accounts for 3 more months after leaving the University. The system administrators will initiate the inactivation of account process after that. It is advised that users should arrange the file transfer before the end of the three-month grace period. Exceptions can be made if there are any special needs. Users can submit the request with justifications directly to the Business and Financial Manager for extension of their access for 3 more months.
DAA/Dunlap Event and Dunlap Travel Calendars
Users who have access to the Calendars would be able to access these calendars for 3 more months after leaving the University. The system administrators will initiate the removal of access after that. Exceptions can be made if there are any special needs. Users can submit the request with justifications directly to the Business and Financial Manager for extension of their access for 3 more months.
You can find a living document on the departmental Slack guidelines here.
Contact the IT administration team for access to the Dunlap Wiki (e.g. Hugh Zhao).
- Whether you print, photocopy or scan, you need your user codes. If you forget or do not have them, please contact Stipe to get yours. Each user has different codes for different purposes.
- Your codes can be used on either MP Ricoh or AB Ricoh unit.
- For printing, please follow the instruction on DADDAA internal page
- If you are not connected to the wired network, when adding printer, your computer won’t be able to automatically discover the appropriate printer. In this case, you need to supply the IP for it: MP Ricoh (128.100.88.13), AB Ricoh (128.100.89.228).
If you need to book a room for a meeting/office hours, you can either book rooms through the Department (AB88, AB113, etc.), or general rooms in the University.
To book a room in AB (e.g. AB88), sign in to the room booking calendar and book from there. Contact Department management for the booking codes
To book a general room/lecture hall on campus, use the LSM.
There are two expense report forms: one for the department, which goes through Gautam, and one for Dunlap, which goes through Joanna. Departmental forms can be found on the internal DAA site; contact IT for the password. Dunlap forms are available on the wiki.
Tips and tricks for preparing reimbursements are given in pinned links and documents in the Slack channel #dunlap_reimbursement. A handy graphic overview is here.
If you have one expense (e.g. lunch, equipment) fill out the applicable fields and send it to Gautam if the source is the department or Joanna if the source is Dunlap. For graduate students and postdoctoral fellows: if the money is coming from your supervisor, make sure you get them to sign it and indicate what account it is coming from before sending it in. For Dunlap people: If you have a set of expenses (e.g. for a conference), use the Dunlap form with multiple tabs for each type of expense. Make sure you include redacted credit card statements or a currency converter from the day of purchase for any expenses in other currencies. If you’ve extended your trip for personal travel, look up the price of flights just for the days of the conference on the same day you book your flights and screenshot the final price (pretend to buy the conference-only flights and stop right before putting in your credit card info). Submit both your actual receipts and the screenshots. You’ll be reimbursed for the full price of your ticket as long as it isn’t more expensive than flights for just the days of the conference. Make sure you attach both itemized and credit card receipts! If you don’t have one of these, you’ll need to fill out the missing receipt form. The form is one of the tabs on the Dunlap expense sheet, or you can ask Gautam for the department version.
There is a dropbox form where you can submit comments or questions anonymously (if you choose) through the Dunlap webpage here.
The Training and Mentoring Committee and GASA organize mentoring pairings between faculty and postdocs, postdocs and graduate students, and graduate students and undergraduates. Pairings usually happen during the fall semester, or shortly before or after arrival in the Department or Institute. You may request a mentor at any time, however! Contact the Training and Mentoring Committee with requests. See details under the relevant faculty/postdoc/graduate student sections below.
- Housing
The university offers faculty housing.
You apply around Dec 1st and they will tell you the result in March-ish. It’s not guaranteed and it all depends on availability of what you asked (e.g 1 bedroom vs. 2 bedroom) vs what they have (i.e. someone is leaving the faculty housing). The rent is usually cheaper. It isn't always available, but they can also send along a list of real-estate agents and some websites for renting a place yourself. The GASA list is also useful (see below)
The rent in Toronto downtown area is in general expensive, e.g. have a bedroom a den near UofT (15 min walk) costs $2500 per month + $100 utility + $100 wifi per month. Living in the suburbs is probably cheape but also include commute.
- Relocation
You can contact the two moving company on the university’s list and they will send people to check your belongings and give you a quote. (You must do at least two quotes). Send the quotes to the department manager and they will approve one of them. The mover info (and other FAQ) can be found online.
- If moving from outside of Canada
You need to get a work permit -- You will get contacted by a lawyer for that from UofT. You will need to apply a Social Insurance Number (SIN) once you arrived at Canada. It takes about 2-3 weeks to receive. You give the number to the department manager so they will set up your payroll. You will be asked to enroll in the benefit program (e.g. insurance, pension) before your arrival. You will create an Canadian bank account after arrival (see details on the relocation website)
How it works: in March/April, the undergraduate chair will send an email to faculty and ask you what course you want to teach and you send back your preference. There might be email back and forth, or schedule an appointment with the chair to have further discussion. And then the teaching for both Fall and Spring (of next year) will all be determined in April.
Tips: a few undergraduate courses are co-taught, e.g. AST325(am I right?), AST301, maybe more? Co-teaching is super helpful as your first time teaching! The university use Quercus and it is definitely helpful to have someone to ask and show you examples. Also, having someone to help you when your student ask for special accommodations/request.
Tips: the department has a lot of undergraduate students and courses so it is likely you are going to teach undergraduate courses. Teaching a graduate course is good way to get graduate student.
Another thing at UofT is mini-courses for graduate student. So you prepare something for 6-weeks instead of 12-weeks (the regular one), and you can propose a talk you are interested in (could be anything) and gauge the interest. If there are enough interest (>5 student?) then you can open it. That might be a good thing to try if you want to get graduate students but do not want to teach a graduate course (I personally never tried though).
The Faculty A&S has a great grant writing supporting team. For example, Monica Caverson can give you some information on who can help read/edit your grants. You probably want to send her an email asap (even before you start at UofT, especially if you are applying for NSERC grants before you start.) After contacting the FAS team, they willl usually will set up a timeline with you and ask you to send them the first draft by certain date.
They will also give you a detailed timeline/instruction for when to submit to the university. The team will read the proposal, make edits and send revision with suggestions.
EDI resources: Almost all the proposal requires you to write some EDI statement or plan, and the NSERC page is useful.
Even though sometime you are applying for some awards that requires statement/proposal, you could still ask them to read for you and the team is professional and have a super quick turn around (usually within 1-2 days for short ones and 3-4 day for long ones). So do not hesitate to contact Monica and the FAS team if you need any guidance.
There is no overhead when you apply to an external grant! (something like 50% in US). You will have an account set on Employee Self-Service (ESS) for grant management. You should be able to see the details of your account details under “My Research” → My Research On Line → Account. If it says you have no permission, then you ask the department manager to help you that.
- What grants to apply for new faculty:
- NSERC Disvoery Grant (DG). This is something you need to apply for other NSERC grant, so try to get it even it is not a lot of money (20-40k/year for new faculty). For DG, you need to submit an Letter of Notice at the beginning of August to be eligible for the application due in the fall. The money will come in April of next year if you are awarded. So as long as you are a faculty by next April, you can apply this round. C
- Connaught Fund New Research -- internal UofT grant, 20k. Not a lot the application is not very long (and you can reuse some of your NSERC DG proposal.
- Ontario Early Researcher Awards -- 150k including matching from the department (NOI due September 23, 2023). This funding requires that you already have Tri-council (e.g. NSERC) funding. Details here
- CIFAR Azrieli Global Scholar Program -- 100k. It has many disciplines. Some of astronomy faculty should be eligible for Gravity & the Extreme Universe
- To be added: Internal funding opportunities (from DAA or Dunlap)
Apart from these grants, there are also a lot of awards for junior faculty. Usually the Award Committee chair (Scott Tremaine right now) will send out the list every few months. You look at it and see what you are eligible for. You can contact Scott (or Bob/Bryan) to nominate you. Do not hesitate to ask if you have any questions. Do not be shy to ask them to nominate you! They department want you to get award (it’s good for the department) so they will try their best to support you.
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Faculty mentoring program Incoming faculty will be paired with a current faculty member within the Department or the Institute, ideally before or shortly after their arrival to U of T. This pairing is initiated by the Department Chair.
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Faculty-postdoc mentoring program The Training and Mentoring Committee runs a program for faculty to mentor postdoctoral fellows within the Department or the Institute. Each year in mid- to late-September, the Training and Mentoring Committee will send a request for faculty mentors. Afterwards, effort is made to pair faculty with postdocs who are outside of their immediate research groups. Faculty should meet with postdoc mentees following the guidelines given by the program document here. Mentor/mentee pairs may change from year to year.
If a student does not have a Masters before joining UofT, then they will take AST1501 and AST1500, during which they will work with a faculty for a project. You do not need to pay the student for this. The department pays the 1st year of a graduate student stiped, before they have selected their advisor.
The cost of a graduate student is split between the department and advisor (and the student gets additional pay for TA duties). Check faculty guidelines or speak to the Graduate Secretary for most up-to-date rates. Importantly, you can buy your student our of TA duties if you have funds or need them full time on a project.
Dunlap covers the publication cost for papers that the students are leading. See details here.
Dunlap and also the Reinhard fund covers some travel for the students. See details the training grant for students
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Summer Undergraduate Research Program (SURP).
The SURP program is organised and run by the SURP committee. It runs from the first week of May through the third week of August each year. In addition to pursuing research, undergraduate students in SURP attend various events that often include a first week computing course, seminars and workshops on various topics, and student presentations.
Requests for potential summer project descriptions are sent by the committee, typically in late fall. Student applications are solicited through the SURP webpages, with an application deadline in late January or early February. Student application packages are shared with SURP supervisors, with selection and employment offers timelines in late February - early March. Funding requirements for the supervisor vary depending on student selection for NSERC awards, faculty position, etc.
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Work study
U of T runs a work study program to hire undergraduates over the Fall/Winter and Summer semesters. Students must be enrolled in courses over the work study period. Project descriptions are solicited in June for Fall/Winter semesters, and in Feb/March for Summer semesters. The application is open, so this program is not suited to hiring a specific student. Selected projects receive funding for 70% of the student pay, with the supervisor contributing the rest.
More information on project descriptions and deadlines can be found on the work study page.
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AST 423/430
Some undergraduate will want to work with you via AST 430: supervised study. You will need to prepare a Syllabus (very brief) and a grading scheme (since you will need give the student a grade at the end). If a student is working with you through a course, you do not need to pay. But you should design the project to train their research skill rather than taking them as free labor.
UofT has a lot of undergraduates majoring in astronomy (~60 per year?) roughly half of them will need to do 4th year thesis project through AST 425 and so in Sept you might be reached by a lot of undergrad looking for projects. It’s a great opportunity to get undergraduates in this way. But be prepared that most of them have no research experience. -
Casual employment
Some students may want to work with you without taking a course, as a casual worker. The rate will be determined by the HR after you submit a list of job duties - but this can be very expensive. There are often issues with unionisation or visa requirements etc. You can specify the number of hours you want them to work per week. Contact Department Admin or the faculty slack channel if you have specific questions.
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Can I take undergrads as voluntary interns (i.e. unpaid)? The answer is yes only if it is a training to benefit the student and not benefit your research. The interns cannot be doing work or providing a service to the employer (i.e. cannot be doing anything to contribute to/advance the PIs research projects). Also, you need to ask the intern to sign a form and send to the department manager.
The SGS Postdoc Fellow Guide is available here, with information about the SGS Postdocral Fellows Office, registration, library access, work permits, health care, family care, athletics, among others.
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Faculty-postdoc mentoring program The Training and Mentoring Committee runs a program for faculty to mentor postdoctoral fellows within the Department or the Institute. Each year in mid- to late-September, the Training and Mentoring Committee will send a request for postdocs who would like faculty mentors. Afterwards, effort is made to pair postdocs with faculty who are outside of their immediate research groups. Your mentorship meetings should follow the guidelines given by the program (document here). Mentor/mentee pairs may change from year to year. Postdoc-graduate student mentoring program
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Postdoc-student mentoring program Similarly, postdoctoral fellows may mentor graduate students within the Department and Institute. The timeline and guidelines are also given in the document here.
Click on this link for more information.
You may speak with Faculty members to explore about the opportunities of co-supervising grad students.
Some useful online resources can be found here.
Postdocs can initiate a mini-course (6-weeks instead of 12-weeks) for astro graduate students (main contact: graduate program director). The GASA Course & Quals Committee usually polls GASA to gauge students' interests of mini-courses. Formalisation of a mini-course requires filling in a form and preparing for a proposed syllabus.
Teaching full courses and guest lectures for undergraduate students may also be possible.
For training, you may want to check out THE500 (Teaching in Higher Education).
If you are a first-time instructor, it is a requirement to take this course by Teaching Assistant's Training Program (TATP).
There are weekly astronomy group Outreach meetings that currently runs 4:10pm on Wednesday. Anyone interested in public astronomy outreach is welcome to join.
Check out the UofT-Astro Slack #jobs channel, AAS jobs register, AcademicJobsOnline, and webpages such as Nature Careers. To receive job ad. through emails, you may want to subscribe to mailing lists such as the (UK) Royal Astronomical Society Job Advertisement Email List. If you are a CASCA member, you will somtimes receive some job ad. emails too.
Check out some tips by Bryan Gaensler and Sarah Maddison here
Each September, you will get an offer letter from the graduate administrator that breaks down your funding sources and lists your final salary for the year The grant money is paid in three instalments in September, January, and May, and you get TA salary payments at the end of each month you TA Each instalment of your grant money may come in multiple separate pieces because the funding comes from different sources (the department, your supervisor, external scholarships, etc). These portions can arrive in your bank account weeks apart from each other! Your TA money and supervisor funded portion of your stipend are paid through the employment system, while the portions that come from the department and A&S are paid through ACORN.
Set up direct deposit in both systems to get your money more quickly. Gautam will reach out about setting up your employee portal, and you can enter direct deposit info in ACORN directly.
Since you aren’t paid regularly, it’s helpful to write out a yearly budget. Use your yearly salary from your September offer letter and divide that by 12 to get your monthly income, and use that to help you stick to a budget.
3 weeks (15 working days) each academic year (September 1st - August 31st). This refreshes every year, does not accrue from year to year. Scheduled holidays and winter break do not count towards these three weeks.
There is no formal way to set vacation dates, usually just inform your supervisor.
[Source: Vacation policy 2022 document from Kristen. Who to contact: Kristen and Margaret]
There are generally two major deadlines for domestic applicants a year for applying to funding, some smaller ones may pop up throughout the year as well
- In september: NSERC and Vanier
- In May: OGS (+ OGS international) and QEII-GSST
Note: these scholarships are only for Canadian students, there are a couple of scholarships for international students too; the grad administrator should reach out to you when there are scholarships that you’re eligible for
There are also internal scholarships within the department that you may be automatically applied for or can apply to [Source: scholarships page Who to contact: Graduate secretary]
Your supervisory committee consists of your supervisor(s) and two other faculty members in the department, you meet with them biannually. They are there to ensure you are making sufficient progress on your thesis and to help you deal with roadblocks you might be facing beyond just research
Timeline:
- Declare your PhD supervisor at the start of your second year
- Reach out to potential committee members and form your committee by December (your supervisor should help with this process)
- First committee meeting in spring of your second year
- Thesis qualifying exam in summer of your second year
- Biannual supervisory committee meetings start in fall of your 3rd year
[Source: Grad student timeline Who to contact: Graduate Chair]
Courses have graded assignments, exams, and presentations (just like undergrad courses). Final grades are usually curved instead of corresponding directly to the grades you get on individual assignments, but this varies by course and instructor
Your grades don’t matter a whole lot - postdoc positions and jobs won’t ask about them. You need to remain in good academic standing, but your exact grades don’t matter nearly as much as they do in undergrad
In general, an A is good, an A- is fine, a B+ is ok, and a B means you struggled with the content. If you get multiple B’s in courses, the grad chair will probably reach out to you to have a chat about your progress in the program and discuss why you’re struggling.
Committee meetings are also graded, and these are your only grades once you’re done with courses. They’re graded pretty similarly to courses in that A’s and A-’s mean that you’re making good progress, potentially with some roadblocks along the way. B+ means you’ve hit some substantial roadblocks and need to work to get past them or fix some issues in your projects before your next meeting. B means you’re not making enough progress toward completion of your projects. If you get a B, your supervisor should discuss the implications with you and together you should come up with a plan to improve things by your next committee meeting. Getting two B's in a row can mean you have to leave grad school.
[Source: Graduate Chair]
The quals consist of literature quals taken in December of the 2nd year, and a thesis/research qualifying exam in the summer of the 2nd year. There is information on the quals on the graduate page. Make sure to also read the expectations page, which gives you some insight into what to expect from the quals and the PhD.
The postdoctoral application process runs from mid September to late March/mid April. Postdoctoral positions are typically advertised online in places like the AAS Job Register and/or Academic Jobs Online.
Applications typically consist of a cover letter, a CV/resume and a research statement. This statement should summarize your past research and describe the new directions of research to plan to undertake in the future. Some postdoctoral positions are to work on a specific project. If that is the case, then your research statement should discuss how you would work in that area, so it is clear to the people reading the application that you are a good fit for the position. Prize postdoc applications present a more self-defined research plan (see below). Postdoctoral positions require three letters of reference. It is a good rule of thumb to keep an idea of who your letter writers are, and to make sure to diversify your research to include more than just your supervisor, so that when the time comes to write a letter you have three people who can write one for you.
When asking for letters of reference, give your letter writers plenty of advance warning, and then give them repeated reminders as the due dates approach. Do not hesitate to remind them (it is easy to get swamped in deadlines if you are writing letters for more than a few people in any job season).
Prize (or independent) postdocs are ones in which you have the research freedom to work on projects that you define, as opposed to working on a topic with a professor who advertises a specific job/focus. There is more academic freedom in a Prize postdoc, but as a result the application for prize postdocs can be more involved and the competition can be fierce.
Applications rest on both your academic history/track record and your research statement. The research statement must include your proposed independent research ideas and plan (and not just a focus on previous work). The statement should usually not talk about your skills (put that in your CV), and not focus on past research or other experiences unless specifically requested. The focus should be on your proposed research (referring to your past work for context as appropriate) and why it is novel and timely. The academic history/track record relies largely on publications. In order to be competitive for prize fellowships, first author papers (submitted, in press or published) are key. There is a review of the statistics on publication numbers for prize postdoctoral positions (and other factors, including number of years since graduation) is here It is worth bearing in mind that there is a ton of great research you can do in a postdoc that is targeted too, so while the publication numbers typical of those who win prize fellowships can be daunting, they are not the only stats of all those who have won a postdoctoral position.
The details on how to finalize, submit and defend your thesis are on the Graduate program page. The key takeaway from that page is that there is a long lead time needed before you can defend. In particular you need to hand in your thesis a full 6 weeks before your defense date, so this date (and the committee) needs to be decided on well in advance.
After your defense, the examination committee will vote on the outcome. The first vote is:
Is the thesis and defense acceptable? a) Yes b) No
If the answer is yes, then committee members vote to accept the thesis either:
- (AS) As It Stands: requires that every examiner, or every examiner bar one, considers the thesis acceptable in its present form.
- (EC) Editorial Corrections: requires that every examiner, or every examiner bar one, considers the thesis either acceptable in its present form, or with minor corrections. These should take less than a month to implement, and can be approved by the supervisor.
- (MR) Minor Revisions: if neither of the other categories applies, then the thesis is approved with revisions, to be defined by committee members. These typically should take less than three months, but a subcommittee must be formed to judge whether the changes have been done sufficiently before approval.