Selection criteria

The GSC normally makes one of four decisions concerning each application received: accept with full scholarship (including fees); accept with a tuition fees waiver; accept without funding; reject. Applicants may, on occasion, be funded directly through a research grant awarded to their supervisor(s). Selection of graduate students is made according to the following criteria:

(1) Qualifications and experience of the candidates, including :

i	Previous degree results
ii	Statement of Purpose (see below for further information)
iii	For applicants who do not have a degree from an English-speaking university, evidence that they have attained the basic level of English language proficiency - TOEFL= 100 for the internet-based test (with a minimum of 22 for the writing section) or IELTS = 7.0 is required
iv	Stature of previous schools and programmes
v	With effect from August 2023, all PhD applicants will be required to submit their GRE (Graduate Record Examination) scores. To meet NUS’s requirement, applicant must obtain an aggregate minimum score of 320 for the Verbal Reasoning and Quantitative Reasoning sections and a minimum score of 3.5 for the Analytical section. However, students with excellent academic track record from renowned universities may request for a waiver of this requirement by uploading a note in the "Documents Upload" section, providing reasons for waiver.
vi	2 Letters of recommendation
vii	Any additional relevant experience (including publications, involvement in seminars, workshops, conferences, relevant work experience etc)

(2) The match between a prospective student and the research interests of faculty; and

(3) Potential contributions to the life of the Department and to the discipline of Geography

Please note that the number of graduate students registered in the Department is constrained by departmental facilities and resources, faculty load and availability of funding – this is to ensure that the community of graduate students in the Department receive supervision and support of the highest order.

Application forms and other relevant information on requirements are available from FASS, Graduate Studies Division.  Interested applicants are strongly encouraged to apply online.  For further queries on the Graduate research application procedure in Geography, please email Ms Pauline Lee.  Pauline is the administrator in the Department with responsibility for providing support to the Graduate Studies programme In Geography.

Candidates are expected to have been in contact with members of academic staff in Geography before applying.  Those interested in applying should therefore first identify and correspond with a member of academic staff in Geography whose research interests closely match their own.  Information on the research interests of academic staff in the Department can be obtained from the profile pages.  Admitted research students will be linked with one or more of three research groupings in the Department.

Once you have submitted your application online and uploaded the supporting documents:

(i) Official or up-to-date academic transcripts,

(ii) degree scroll (if applicable),

(iii) Statement of Purpose, and

(iv) TOEFL/IELTS result (if any - for international applicants),

please email geobox1@nus.edu.sg to notify the Geography officer.

Referees Reports

First and foremost, please assign the two referees to the application, especially if you initiate your application less than 2 weeks before its closing date.

An email notification will automatically be sent to the referees once you assigned them to the task. Please refer to the user guide. Applicants are not required to submit the reports on behalf of the referees.  You may wish to alert them in advance to complete the report.