The Arts & Science Program stresses active, self-directed, and cooperative interdisciplinary learning with an emphasis on social awareness. A hallmark of the program is its engaged and supportive community, which draws together people with a wide range of experiences, perspectives, and interests, and thrives on the open exchange, development, and refinement of ideas.
As part of our ongoing efforts to contribute to equity and grow and support the diversity of the program community, we are proud to introduce an Equitable Admissions Process for students who identify as Black and/or Latin American/Latinx. This process aims to contribute to dismantling barriers to postsecondary education experienced by Black and/or Latin American/Latinx students, and thus ultimately to enhance the Arts & Science community of learning.
About the Equitable Admissions Process
Applicants are eligible to be considered under the Arts & Science Equitable Admissions Process for Black and/or Latin American/Latinx Students if they identify as Black and/or Latin American/Latinx. This is an optional process; if you identify as Black and/or Latin American/Latinx, you are not required to opt in to the process to be considered for admission, though you are welcome to do so.
Through the Equitable Admissions Process, admission offers will be made to applicants who have met the Program admission requirements, have comparable academic records and supplementary application scores to other applicants, and identify as Black and/or Latin American/Latinx. Applicants must meet the same application standards and requirements as all other applicants. The process does not involve quotas, and admission is not guaranteed for applicants who opt in. Instead, the process will take existing inequities and barriers to postsecondary education into consideration by prioritizing offers to Black and/or Latin American/Latinx applicants in a small number of cases where applicant grades and supplementary application scores are similar to those of other applicants.
How to Apply via the Equitable Admission Process
- Applicants who wish to be considered under the Equitable Admission Process should apply to the Arts & Science Program as per the standard process. Visit the Future.McMaster website for application information.
- Applicants must meet the same academic requirements as all other applicants, and complete the same supplementary application.
- Students applying via the Equitable Admission Process submit their Supplementary Application as per the standard process (instructions here). The Supplementary Application will provide all applicants with the opportunity to indicate if they wish to participate in the Equitable Admissions Process if they are eligible (i.e., if they identify as Black and/or Latin American/Latinx).*
- Like all other applications, those submitted via the Equitable Admission Process will be considered by members of the Arts & Science Application Review Committee, who will have received equity-relevant training. This committee will include people who identify as members of equity-denied groups wherever possible.
- In order to counter well-documented barriers to access affecting Black and/or Latin American/Latinx students, a small percentage of all program admission offers will be made through this equitable admissions process to students who opted in, have comparable academic records and supplementary application scores to other applicants, and identify as Black and/or Latin American/Latinx. This is not a quota system, and admission is not guaranteed for applicants who opt into the process. Rather, existing barriers and inequities affecting Black and/or Latin American/Latinx students will simply be factored into decision-making in cases where applicant grades and scores are close to one another.
If you have any questions about your application through the equitable admissions process, please contact Dr. Beth Marquis (beth.marquis@mcmaster.ca).
FAQs about the Arts & Science Equitable Admission Process
No. You do not need to provide further demographic information. Instead, your demographic information will be accessed from information you provide to the Ontario Universities Applications Centre when you apply (if you elect to complete this information). Please note that falsifying your identity to participate in this process is a violation of academic integrity, and will be treated accordingly.*
Anyone who identifies as Black and/or Latin American/Latinx and meets the admission requirements. This might include people who identify as Black Canadian, Black African, Black Caribbean, Black Indigenous, Black Mixed, Afro-Latinx, Black Latinx, Asian Latin American, Black Latin American, Indigenous peoples of Latin America, Mestizx/o/a Latin American, or people who identify as multi-racial including Black and/or Latin American/Latinx identity. This is not meant to be an exhaustive list.
No. Responses to the question asking about participation in the Equitable Admission Process will be removed from the supplementary application, along with other directly identifying information, before the application is assessed. Program administrative staff will have access to this information, though.
All applicants will be assessed according to the usual application review procedures. Black and/or Latin American/Latinx applicants who opt into the process will be expected to meet the same application standards and requirements as all other applicants.
Given that the equitable admissions process will only affect a small percentage of admissions offers, students who identify as Black and/or Latin American/Latinx might receive offers through the regular admissions process, even if they opt into the equitable admissions stream.
We hope that this process will help to further enhance the community of learning in the Arts & Science program by providing another mechanism to work intentionally toward increasing the diversity of our student group by mitigating barriers that affect Black and/or Latin American/Latinx students.
The aim of the process is to acknowledge and respond to the large amount of evidence that demonstrates the inequities and barriers to postsecondary education experienced by Black and/or Latin American/Latinx students in Ontario and Canada. The process is intended to mitigate the impacts of these systemic barriers and inequities and thus to help promote substantive equality. The process does not aim to give Black and/or Latin American/Latinx applicants an advantage in the admissions process, but rather to address, to the extent possible, existing inequities and thus promote fair and equitable admissions.
This stream of our Equitable Admissions Process focuses specifically on Black and/or Latin American/Latinx students given the large body of evidence that points to barriers to postsecondary education and other injustices affecting students who identify as members of these groups. Available demographic information also indicates that these barriers may be affecting the representation of Black and/or Latin American/Latinx students in the Arts & Science program.
The Black Student Success Centre (BSSC) is dedicated to supporting and championing the academic, personal and professional success and overall well-being of Black/African descent students and fostering a positive Black student and athlete experience.
Services and events include:
- General Check-In
- Financial Aid Literacy/ Counselling
- Scholarship, Bursaries & Awards Support
- Black Student Wellness: Group & 1:1
- Black Student Mentorship Program
- Black Faculty Office Hours
- Career and Post-graduate Counselling
- Opportunity to be a tutor: Grade 11 & 12 Tutoring / First-Year Transition Support
- Convocation: Black Grad Celebration event
The BSSC supports many Black-focused student groups on campus including the African Caribbean Graduate Student Association, Blackspace, Black Aspiring Physicians of McMaster, Black Student Association, Law Aspiring Black Students, MacAfricans, McMaster Association of Caribbean And West Indian Students, Nu Omega Zeta Sorority, Pitch Magazine & more!
Contact BSSC:
Website: blackstudentsuccess.mcmaster.ca
Email: bss@mcmaster.ca
The Latin American Network at McMaster University (LANMU) celebrates, recognizes, and empowers the Latinx/Latin American communities at McMaster, which is composed of diverse multilingual, multi-religious, multi-ethnic, multi-racial, multicultural, and plurinational communities. This includes individuals who identify as Afro-Latinx, Black Latin Americans, Indigenous peoples of Latin America, Asian Latin Americans, Mestizx/o/a Latin Americans, and White Latin Americans.
LANMU offers a variety of student-focused initiatives, including:
- The Latin American/Latinx Student Mentorship Program (LALS-MP) that fosters connections between undergraduate and graduate students, facilitates students’ transition from secondary school to university, and promotes active mentorship relationships within the Latin American and Latinx communities at McMaster.
- The Latin American Health Science Student Success Initiative (LAHSSSI) is an initiative that aims to provide academic and skill supports for Latin American/Latinx Students with interests in Health Sciences/Medicine.
- Poderosas Circle, conversation circles for Latin American and Latinx womxn at McMaster.
LANMU is also a driving force behind the Interdisciplinary Minor in Latin American and Latinx Studies (LALS). This minor was launched in 2022, and seeks to expose students to methodologies, knowledge, and theoretical frameworks that might help them understand and investigate questions such as, “What is Latin America?” and “What are Latinx Studies?” Arts & Science students can add the LALS minor to their Artsci degree.
Contact LANMU:
Website: lanmu.mcmaster.ca
Email: latam@mcmaster.ca
*Individuals who misrepresent their eligibility for the Equitable Admissions Process may be subject to the provisions and processes of McMaster’s Academic Integrity Policy under section 18.m, which states that it is an offense under the policy to “submit false information for the purpose of gaining admission.”