Correen on the panellist side,
So, just to familiarize people with the chat box you have the
option to adjust your settings so that you're responding to either all
participants which means that everybody who's joining the webinar will see your
chat – what you're typing in. Or you have the option to select one panelist only
or host only. It's up to you, whatever you're most comfortable with. You can
adjust the settings. If you send something to just JC and I as
hosts, we probably won't be able to respond to you while we're giving the
presentation. So please select either all participants if you want everyone to see
it or just panellist if it's private. OK, so we're going to move on. Thank you to
everyone for letting us know where you are in the world.
OK, so Key Dates. We're going to review some important dates and deadlines off
the top, so if you have not yet registered you have until April 19th for
on-time registration. There is a late registration fee of $50 if you don't
complete your registration on time. Now the deadline to pay your tuition is May
1st, however your account won't begin to accrue interest charges until the 29th
of May, so technically you have until May 29th
to pay your tuition balance. But we'll go over that a little bit later again.
When do classes begin? So if you are taking summer classes which I think is a
little bit rare for grad students, but they'll begin after May 1st. It
depends on your program so please check with your program for the first date in
your course schedule. And also please note that McMaster campus will be
completely closed on May 21st, July 2nd August 6th, and September 3rd for various
national or provincial holidays. Let's talk about travel travel documentation
now. So first of all, we're not certified immigration consultants and cannot
comment on study permit issues or visa requirements, but all the
information you're required can be found on the Citizenship and Immigration
Canada, also know as CIC, website – we've posted the links on the
slide here. The study permits are required by all international students to study
in Canada. You might also have to get a travel visa or something called ETA
to enter Canada. Please make sure you have all your required documentation. If
you aren't sure, please refer to the CIC website. It may take some time to find
information but it's there. Once you arrive on campus, you need to present
your study permit to the School of Grad Studies which is located in Gilmour Hall
212, and maintain a valid study permit until the end of your program. Just as a
side, note after you present your study permit us to SGS (Graduate Studies) you'll be able to pick
up a student card.
OK, now that we've covered key dates and travel documentation, let's talk
about your arrival and getting settled in Hamilton and at McMaster. We just
wanted to know another question for the chat box. We'd like to know when you plan
to arrive in Canada. I know some of you have stated that you're already here and
so we'd like to know: Are you already here in Canada? Or do you plan to arrive
before May 1st or after May 1st? If you could let us know in the chat box
if you're comfortable, that will help us to adjust our resources for you. (May 8th)
Anybody else care to share when they'll be arriving or if you're already here or
maybe you're not sure yet. Anybody here actually planning to start in September?
After May 1st? (Not sure yet exactly.) OK, thank you very much for letting us
know. You can continue to enter stuff in the chat box, if you'd like. OK, so
very important information is how to get to Hamilton. So you'll arrive most
likely at Pearson Airport, and then there are several ways you can actually get to
downtown Hamilton. Just to give you a rough estimate, it takes between 45
minutes to an hour to get here from the airport and that really depends on the
time of the day. There are several options. I will try to guide you through
them and their main advantages and their drawbacks. So the first option is the
taxi limo and it's extremely convenient because that's a door-to-door
service. But it's also a little bit more expensive. It's going to cost you around
$100. Another way which is very convenient and just a little bit
cheaper is Airways Transit, which is also a door-to-door service. But you may
have to wait a little bit longer before you go from the airport. And I think
it's about $90 one way for adults. The cheapest way is to use the GO
Transit. GO Transit is the transit company that is operating in the GPS or
the area around Toronto. It's a very convenient bus service and it's really
cheap compared to the other option. it's only $11, about $12 for a
single ride. There is free Wi-Fi at the airport to check the schedule, so you
don't have to go outside. You can also ask many people there; they all know
about it. Make sure you get on the right bus though, and the one that is going
towards Hamilton, and not the other one. We really think it's the cheapest option
and especially good if you don't have too many luggages. You can also look into
other options such as Uber or those kind of options. OK, so you pick the
date that you got want to come here, you got here from the airport, and now you
need a place to live. Or maybe you'll start searching beforehand. So we're
going to talk about housing search tips. You will not find campus housing for
grad students her,e but you can secure housing through the private market so
we're providing some links. But please note that these are online public
classified ads and we don't endorse any one site. These are
some common sites where students find accommodations. So the Mac off-campus web
site also has a roommate finder function and you can
search by the type of housing, such as shared accommodation, grad student
house and so on. Kijiji and Craigslist are also common ways to find rental
accommodation here. And Facebook - if you have Facebook - this is also a good tool
to use. Look for the McMaster student housing post board Facebook page and
the International Grad Student or IGSA Facebook group to post and browse the
housing you are seeking. If you have some fluency in Chinese language or access to
google translate extension, there's a student-created manual on the web, the
link is listed here, and it gives a lot of detail about housing in Canada as
well. Students from China can also join the QQ group for community messages.
There's another program that has started here in the last year
called Mac Symbiosis, and this is a volunteer-run program that will match
you with a senior citizen where you can live with them in their house and pay a
lower, usually lower, than market rent in exchange for helping them out with some
services, such as groceries, housework or simply companionship. So the
Symbiosis program, if you're interested in that you can find out more on the
Symbiosis Facebook page or the School of Graduate Studies website. I mentioned
that because I know that matching will be taking place over the summer and a
lot of the housing that you'll see posted right now will be summer sublets,
so shorter term leases between May and September. This is a good thing in
some ways for those who are arriving now because there's actually quite a bit of
housing available through summer sublets. so you shouldn't have too much trouble
finding a place. But the downside is that you may have to find another place and
move again for September which is kind of a drag, but hopefully those links are
helpful to you and you can explore them at your own pace.
So when you're renting a place in Canada, it is common for a landlord to ask you
for these items listed here. So you'll probably be asked to complete
an application form, provide references, sign a lease and provide both first and
last month's rent on the first day of your tenancy. It's important to know your
rights as a tenant and some of the rules around tenancy on Ontario. For example,
you have a right to ask for receipts for your rent from your landlord, and this
will be especially important if you're paying with cash. As well as for when you
file your Canadian income taxes, you can get a bit of a refund. You can follow
the link at the bottom here to learn more about the rights and
responsibilities of landlords and tenants. So far we've dealt with very
formal information: how to register, how to get a place to live. There's also
something that is really important: you need to get to know your your city
when you get here. Here you can see a map of the city on the right part of the
slide. The city is pretty big and downtown is actually a very small
portion of it. but in there you'll be able to find a lot of different places
and there's really something for everybody here. There are cafes,
restaurants and one of the main attractions in
Hamilton is the waterfalls. It's known as the capital of waterfalls
here, so you can get on trails, check out waterfalls and just enjoy nature a
little bit. There is a very useful link which is Nature@MacMaster.ca
that you can use as a resource to find trails and ways to explore either before
you get started or afterwards
As a full-time graduate student, you can ride the bus for free starting
in September in late August you'll be able to get your bus pass at the campus
store. It's a green card similar to the picture here. When you're getting on the
bus, you can simply tap this card into a depressor device each time you board the
bus and there's also a short video that you can watch about Presto to learn more.
The link is there. Your presto can be used outside of Hamilton as well, however
your bus pass does not include these costs so do make sure to load up your
card at the transit office machine or online before getting on to transit
other than that in Hamilton. You can also load your presto card at the Student
Centre. For the summer months, before you'll have your bus pass -
from May through August to the end of August - you'll have to pay for the bus
yourself. It's $2.30 per ride and you can get your own Presto
card for the summer months. Now let's talk about what you should or what you
should not pack. Obviously this is a personal call in any case, but we like to
provide you with some advice. Typically you can find all the food
items from all over the world at supermarkets her,e so you don't really
need to pack food items unless you you really want something in particular.
What about dishes and kitchen stuff? There's a there's a lot you can acquire
here for fairly cheap if you go to the dollar store, so we highly recommend you
not to bring any dishes or kitchen housewares because you will be able to
get them here. For bedding and sheets and those kind of things, it's really a
personal call. iIt can be really expensive here but it's also very bulky to pack
and to carry afterwards. Regarding winter clothing: you can purchase it here
and we actually recommend you to purchase it here because it's going to
be better quality for the price you're
going to pay, especially because the winter can get really cold here so you'd better
have the right clothing. And also for you guys, you're going to come here in May so
it's not going to be a very big deal because it's not going to be that cold.
For the chat box again, just to be a bit more interactive, can you
let us know if you have any other ideas of what to pack or maybe if you're
already here, is there anything that you didn't pack that you wish you did?
OK, we're going to move on to the next slide so we're going to talk
about working in Canada. You need a social insurance number, otherwise known
as SIN, to work in Canada, and this includes working as a TA or any other
employment. Getting your SIN is one of the very
first things you should be doing once you arrive. You can't
get your TA pay without a SIN, so it's really important. It does not cost any
money to apply, and when you obtain the number
you need to present your passport and your study permit for the application.
You can also ask and apply for your SIN at the airport if you are arriving at
Pearson Airport, so that's very convenient. You can get it right after
you land. However, if you miss this option, your next option would be to go to City
Hall in downtown Hamilton on a Friday. Check the website for the hours, and then
otherwise you will have to visit a Service Canada office. I say 'have to' only
because it's a little bit further away by bus, but still doable. Please note
that for international students, your SIN does expire., It's based on the date that
your study permit expires so do be sure to keep both up to date.
One other very important thing when you first get here is to set up a bank
account. Please note that our office does not endorse any one Bank, however we've
listed 5 major Canadian banks here. Most banks have special offers for
students and most will have information for international students on their
website. All of the banks are regulated in Canada and have to follow the same
financial rules, so it's really just a matter of researching the different
offers and picking a bank that is close to your home or the school. To
get a bank account, you will need to provide a couple of
documents. The first one will be the passport. You'll also need your study
permit, and then you will most likely need an address verification, such as a
piece of mail, a bill or a lease just to prove that you live in that place. Just
make sure to open that bank account as soon as you can because you will need
that bank account before you can set up the direct deposit for your pay. So it's
really important to do that quite quickly. Another useful thing may be to
get a cell phone. So getting a cell phone in Canada is fairly simple, but
you need to first choose your provider. In order to sign up for a plan, you will
need a credit card and the provider may ask you for a deposit at first. This
deposit will come back to you within four month to about six months.
Having a cell phone can be really expensive in Canada, so you need to
decide on your plan carefully. We do not endorse any company and it is often
a trade-off between having good service but paying a little bit more and
paying a little bit less but having limited service. So here you can see five
logos of the main companies, and just to give you an example: Bell and Rogers are
the biggest companies here and they usually provide a very good service. But
it's also really expensive, when Freedom, Telus and Fido are cheaper, but
you may encounter situations where you don't have service even though you would
expect to have some. So just make sure you talk around you with other people to
know what they have, what the service is, and then think carefully what you want
for your cell phone. OK, so if you haven't figured this out by now, moving
to Canada can be quite expensive. There are a lot of initial startup costs that
you can expect, such as paying first and last month's rent, and deposit for a cell
phone. There is a website called expatistan. It's linked here and it's
quite up to date for estimating your expenses in Hamilton. It lists pretty
much everything that you would have to buy and what amounts you can
expect to pay. It probably will be helpful for you to be
aware of when you will be paid your TA or scholarship fund from the
University. So you can check your payment schedule through the link that's posted
here and also posted on the SGS (Grad Studies) website under resources. Next thing on the
list: how to get groceries. As a student you'll get student discounts at
multiple places, so make sure to take advantage of these deals. For example
multiple grocery stores give you 10 percent discount every Tuesday. The
Shoppers Drugmart that is just located in front of the University gives you 20
percent discount on Thursday. There's also a very cheap store
for fresh produce which is located on 60 Ewen Road, so for vegetables and
fruit this is probably the cheapest place you can find. But they only accept
cash so just make sure you bring cash and do not expect to be able to pay with
a credit card.
We hope we've made you excited about life in Hamilton with all the
great deals for students, but we do have to sort out some more documents as well.
In terms of registration, it's important to register online before
April 19th, so you can follow this link to navigate through the proces.
There are three terms in an academic year here and you will be registering
for the summer term at this time. After registration you will see some
tuition fees showing up on your account page with a due date of May 1st. Do not
worry, there will not there will be no charge
interest from you until May 29th. So technically you'll have until May
29th, 2018 to pay your tuition and fees. But by this time you'll have a bank
account set up and you'll be receiving scholarship money. In addition to the
tuition fee though, you will need to pay supplemental fees as well, which
includes Graduate Students Association or the health insurance. To pay your
tuition fee, we recommend transferring funds from your bank to McMaster. The
most convenient method will be to transfer from your Canadian bank account
but if needed it is possible to transfer funds from a bank outside of Canada as
well. So follow this link here to learn more about this. Before making a payment
you will need to confirm how much you need to pay. To do this, go to
Mosaic and log in to see your student account. Your student account will show
you all financial activity as it pertains to your education at McMaster.
It will show you the payments received, scholarships, bursaries, purchases and
other miscellaneous financial activity. So all of this will show up on your
student account in real time. Be sure to monitor your student account
regularly to ensure it is in good status. You will not receive a bill or an
invoice for your tuition, but you can print statements directly from your
Student Centre online. So on your Offer Letter,
your Offer Letter will contain your funding sources in the mail. All the
information you require can be found on the links that are on the slides so
we've been referring to links on the site but don't worry we're just going to
send out the slides after. You'll be able to click on them. You don't have to take
notes of that. The sooner you can provide your direct deposit information to the
university, the easier it will be for getting paid. So make sure to
introduce yourself to your department secretaries. They will let you know if
you have to do any extra paperwork and what you actually have to do to get
started. Now I'll try to guide you through the different grad communities
that you'll be part of and here I'll list some alpha groups and networks that
you're sure to interact with at some point in your grad life.
The first one is the School of Graduate
Studies which is the central
administration. It encompasses all six faculties and deals with admission,
graduation, PhD defences, rules and regulations. The second one is
the Graduate Students Association that everybody refers to as GSA. It's a
student association that is operated by, and for, the students. They deal
with the health and dental coverage, the sport leagues, the Phoenix restaurant, the
grad student clubs, and all these kind of student life type of activities. And then
there is CUPE 3906 which is the Union for the TA's and the RA's. It's a labour union
for, as I said, teaching assistant or research assistant, and we are protected under the collective agreements and they also provide dental plan for those
of us that are TA's. A little bit more about this here, there is the on-campus
ISS, which is the International Student Services. So usually you will
deal with them to pay your UHIP which is the health insurance here. We'll come
back to that in a moment. Then there are grad student groups.
So there is iGSA which is International Grad Student Association that I'm
actually part of as well. What we try to do is organize social
events, immigration presentations to help you to get your visa sorted, or these
kind of things to try to really improve your life here at Mac. Then there are
Faculty-based associations, such as EGS for those of you that are going to be in the
engineering faculty. There is SAM which is the Scientist Association at Mac,
which is for people in science. And then there is the African Caribbean Grad
Student Association if you're from that area. And then off campus there is a very
nice group that is Global Hamilton Connect, and they are extremely helpful and
they deal with a broader scope because they also deal with just people
living in Hamilton. There are good chances that you will interact with at
least one of these groups, so make sure to introduce yourself. And there's a lot
of opportunities to volunteer or take a little bit of leadership in those
associations. OK, so we're going to talk about taking care of your health. In
addition to knowing where to go for socialization it's important to know
where to go to take care of your health of course, so we do have a dentist a
pharmacy and a medical clinic on campus. The clinic is called the Student
Wellness Centre and it's located in the basement of the Student Centre. The Student
Centre is often referred to as MUSC just to confuse you a little bit more. It's
stands for McMaster University Student Centre. To see a doctor in the
Student Centre, it is by appointment and you can go there if you get sick or you
need a prescription. The cost of going to see your doctor, the family
doctor here at the clinic is covered under your UHIP health insurance so you
don't need to pay the doctor directly. We're going to cover more about UHIP in
the next slide. I wanted to mention that there are two dental plans on
campus depending on whether you are a TA or not, and we'll cover this in detail
in an upcoming slide as well. The
health insurance for International students is called UHIP as we said, and it covers
the cost for emergency medical care so if you go to the hospital or a
physician visit that we just discussed that you can go to in MUSC. It is
actually mandatory for all international students and their accompanying
dependents so if you have a wife or children coming with you you need to
make sure to go to ISS, and let them know you have some people with you. Then you
need to enroll them so that they have enough insurance here. For you, you will
be automatically enrolled anyway, but it's really important for the dependents.
Some advice: always carry your UHIP card on you just in case
something happens. And also, if you're a TA make sure you check out with CUPE
Association because you can get a $200 rebate every academic
year, and trust me, this is really helpful.
All right so we're going to try to explain the difference between the
different plans and who pays for what and what's covered by who. In terms
of medical care - this is coverage for ongoing medical conditions,
vaccinations, sexual and reproductive health, anything non-emergency. It also
covers mental health counseling, so a psychologist, social worker and wellness
group, a prescription for medications or lab tests. All of these that I just
listed, you can go to it the doctor's office for in the Student Wellness
Centre which is located on campus. You can also see a family doctor. You can
find a family doctor outside of the Student Wellness Centre as well, if
that's your preference. Then there's what's called paramedical benefits and
that covers things like physiotherapy, a naturopath, massage therapy,
tele-counseling, and costs for your prescription drugs and also eyeglasses.
These kinds of services are covered through GSA - Grad
Students Association - benefits that are paid for in your mandatory supplemental
fees. These you would require to pay out-of-pocket in a lot of cases, so you'd
go to studentcare.ca for more information. And then, in terms of dental
care, I mentioned there is a dental office on campus that's familiar with
the various dental plans so you won't have to pay up front but you can also
find a dentist closer to your home if that's more convenient. So if you're a TA,
you're going to use the CUPE plan for dental and if you're not a TA you will
use the GSA plan. And don't forget, as JC mentioned, TA's you can get $200 back from
the CUPE office, so do take advantage of that. Finally I just want to cover
something because when I first got here I was really confused where to go if I
if I was getting sick. So the first thing to know is that if it's an emergency, you
need to call 9-1-1 or try to get yourself to hospital. If it's not an
emergency illness, you can make an appointment with the Student Wellness
Centre to get a doctor to help you to deal with it.
And finally, if it's an after-hours non-emergency, you can visit a walk-in
clinic but that may require payment up front and then you can place a claim to
get reimbursed. All of these that I mentioned before are covered by UHIP
and then you will depend if you need to claim or if you won't even have to pay
up front. If you requires specialized care, then you need to first see a
regular doctor and then get the specialized physician. So
let's take an example: you get hurt playing sport and you need to see a
sport doctor. You won't be able to get to the sport doctor first. You need
to get to your regular physician and then get referred to that person. So
I think I think that covers most of what you need to know if you get sick.
OK, so we've pretty much wrapped up the presentation portion for the webinar but
this is a really important slide because we'd like to invite you to a
social event for our new grad students as a chance to meet each other and also
some returning grad students as well. We've planned an event for you on May
15th at 4 p.m. It's called the Altitude Alpine Tower and that is a rope-
and-climbing tower on the McMaster campus. You can read more about it on the
altitude website. But the staff at altitude are trained to aid in community
building between groups, so please come out and make new friends and get an
introduction to the School of Graduate Studies and the International Grad
Students Association at McMaster. We will have programming available for all
abilities and experience levels, so don't worry if you don't have experience with
climbing or if you're afraid of heights. And if that doesn't interest you,
there'll be other activities that everyone can participate in, and we're
going to have a bonfire campfire and an pizza after so it should be an
interesting time. You will receive a direct invitation by email after this
webinar so we hope that you'll sign up. And we do promise there'll be something
in it for everyone so don't worry, don't be scared. We hope you'll join us. We
just wanted to acknowledge our panellists who have been online here, entering your
questions in chat forums. Thank you so much to all of the panelists: Sebastian
Himbert, Mai Yamamoto, Vi Dang, Wing, Cheung, Correen Smith
and Judi Pattison. Thank you so much. All of these folks that I listed are part
members of the International Grad Student Association.
So this concludes the formal presentation and you can contact us
through the School of Graduate Studies and the iGSA email addresses that are
listed here.Don't forget to join the I GSA Facebook group and like the Graduate Studies
Facebook page to stay connected. Now the panelists will be on hand for a few more
minutes and if you have any other questions for the Q&A or any feedback
you wanted to share with the panelists or other participants through the chat
box, please feel free to communicate that way. The slides and presentation
will be emailed out to you and we're excited to meet you at the main social
event.
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