US/Canadian Dual Citizenship, unsure what steps to take

Student Lounge International Students
1

I have a dual citizenship between the US and Canada; my mother was Canadian and made sure I had a Canadian citizenship when I was born. I’m graduating high school in the US this year and I’m interested in possibly attending a university in Canada. I haven’t been able to find much help for this specific situation, and contacting Canadian universities has been far more difficult than getting in touch with universities in the US (specifically, Ryerson University, which is my main interest right now). I was wondering

  • Will I be able to pay the domestic rate rather than the international price? If so, what would I need to prove I’m a Canadian citizen?
  • As I’m only really looking to apply to a few schools in Ontario, would I use the OUAC? Do I fill out the 105D form?
  • How do I submit official documents like transcripts? Do I need to somehow “translate” my US grades/GPA to a Canadian version? (If that makes any sense)
  • Can I get Canadian financial aid? Can I use federal loans or scholarships from the US with a Canadian School?
    If anyone could help I would appreciate your input greatly. I would email the University itself if I could, but it seems that I can only call them or use their ask ryerson online FAQ search thing (which does not address this specific situation). Thank you!
2

Most of your questions can be answered on the Ryerson or OUAC websites. You will pay the Canadian tuition rate. Everyone applying to Ontario universities use the OUAC to apply. Universities do not have separate applications. The instructions for transcripts are on the website. You would need a Canadian passport or some other citizenship paper, your mother should have that if you do not.

Canadian universities do not offer hand holding like many US colleges do.

3

My main issue is that the websites answer question about being an international applicant, but I can’t find anything about American students with Canadian citizenship. I have some very specific questions, but there isn’t an email I can contact to ask those questions. My high school’s guidance department also isn’t much help; they know less than I do about applying to Canadian schools. I’m mainly scared of finding out that my application was filled out incorrectly, or I needed to send a different, special transcript, etc. Thank you for the response!

4

You are an international applicant. Your dual citizenship will only come into play for determining tuition rate. For example, UToronto requires SAT/ACT scores for American applicants, that is, applicants coming out of an American high school. What each university requires is on the universities’ admissions website.

For Ryerson:

http://www.ryerson.ca/admissions/undergraduate/requirements/international/

5

@eczwww

TomSr covered the application issues well.

Most Canadian financial aid is covered by a separate government entity, called OSAP in Ontario. Each province has its own system. Since you have never lived in Canada though, you don’t qualify for OSAP or other provincial aid. http://settlement.org/ontario/education/colleges-universities-and-institutes/financial-assistance-for-post-secondary-education/who-is-eligible-for-the-ontario-student-assistance-program-osap/

You may get financial aid from Ryerson though. You can enquire at one of the emails on this page: http://www.ryerson.ca/sfa/

You are eligible for aid through FAFSA. Check out their website. https://studentaid.ed.gov/sa/prepare-for-college/choosing-schools/types/international

6

@eczwww

P.S.

For OUAC, you would fill out the 105D application, since you are a Canadian citizen living elsewhere. https://www.ouac.on.ca/ouac-105/ If you scroll all the way down to the bottom of the page, you will find a phone number to contact OUAC if you have questions.

7

Do you have a Certificate of Canadian Citizenship? In our experience this took quite a while (~9 months). However, when you write “…and made sure I had a Canadian citizenship when I was born”, this sound like exactly what your mother probably already got you.

Assuming that you already have this, you need to get your applications in. The deadline for applying to many Canadian and American universities has already passed. One option of course is to take a gap year and apply next year. I have also heard that there are a few universities for which the deadline has not yet passed (Waterloo, Trent, Dalhousie, Acadia – all very good universities). I don’t know about Ryerson.

Before showing up to attend university in Canada you need to to get a Canadian passport. However, with the certificate of Canadian Citizenship already in hand the passport only takes about two weeks or so. Note that the photo requirements for Canadian passports is different from American passports. Thus you either need to find a photo shop in the US who know the Canadian requirements, or go into pretty much any photographers shop or drug store in Canada and get the photo done there. When you send in your passport application you will also need to send in your Certificate of Canadian Citizenship. Keep a copy because you might need it for a step below. They will return it about the same time as your passport shows up.

You will need to get a social insurance card. This is the Canadian equivalent of a social security card. I am told that this takes about 15 minutes at any services Canada location. There are a lot of these all across Canada. We were supposed to do this a few weeks ago for my daughter (who will start university in Canada in September), but due to one of the recent snow storms weren’t able to do it on our last trip so I don’t actually have experience with this step. You will need to take both your Canadian passport and your original Certificate of Canadian Citizenship with you when you get this.

Yes you pay the Canadian price. There is a special deal at McGill for “Canadians born abroad” who pay the same rate as residents of Quebec, which is actually less than the rate for other Canadians. However, when applying you send the same information that they expect from Americans, such as SAT scores for most large universities (not needed at Acadia and some other small universities). You will need to fax or scan and email a copy of your certificate of Canadian Citizenship to the university in Canada that you attend.

Your US high school will need to send your transcript to whatever universities you apply to, regardless of whether they are in the US or in Canada. Ditto for SAT (sending to a Canadian university is the same as to a US university – each university has a code which tells the SAT where to send your scores). No translation needed (most Canadians can speak American well enough ;-).

My daughter is just hearing back from universities in Canada (applications were in a month or two ago), and is getting financial aid offers. The first one that we got was better than I expected. However, you are probably past the deadline for applying for this year if you want financial aid. If you take a gap year and if you have sufficient grades then financial aid from the university is possible. Without any aid, Canadian citizens attending Canadian universities are nearly always paying less, sometimes much less, than American citizens with the same grades attending academically comparable US universities.

You can use funds from a US 529 plan for Canadian universities. I have no idea about loans.

There are many good reasons for Dual citizens who live in the US to attend university in Canada. Best wishes!

8

This is great info, @DadTwoGirls. My D18 is a dual citizen born and raised in the US, and she is planning to go to university in Canada (UBC, McGill, or U of T). We have her Certificate of Citizenship and her Canadian passport, but I was not aware of the need for a social insurance card. Does she need it before she can enroll at university, or can it be done once she’s moved in? I am in Toronto with her right now but I don’t have the proper paperwork with me.

9

Regarding the social insurance card: One university told me that she needs it to enroll. However, others haven’t mentioned it yet. Thus I am not really sure. if you are in Toronto perhaps you can ask at whichever universities you are visiting and post the answer. It might be that she needs it to receive financial aid. The university that said that she needs it is one where we expect to get some merit based financial aid, although we haven’t heard the details yet.

10

One nit that I might add: A couple of the universities that my daughter applied to seemed to have missed the fact that she is a Canadian citizen, and along with her acceptance letter also sent information for how an International / American student applies for things like visa’s (and in one case some sort of province of Quebec permit). We contacted them, explained that she is a Canadian citizen (actually dual), and they explained that a visa is not needed, and had us fax them a copy of either her Canadian passport or certificate of Canadian citizenship. This was actually pretty easy. We have been dealing with small primarily undergraduate universities and have found the admissions people very helpful. In limited dealings with larger universities we have found the process a bit slower, but have found the people very helpful once you get through to them. We used fax rather than emailing a scan because IMHO the term “Internet security” is a contradiction.