Honours and awards for achievements in research and innovation offer meaningful recognition to our faculty within their disciplines, and celebrating these achievements is also important to the University of Toronto (U of T). This page outlines the University’s recognition practices for recipients of research and innovation honours and awards, and the measures used to consider how our award winners contribute to the University’s national and global leadership in research and innovation.
To report an award received by a faculty member to the Division of the Vice-President, Research and Innovation (VPRI) and the recipient’s academic division, please use our new Faculty Award Reporting Form!
Please note that Honours & Awards received by faculty can also now be explored in a new VPRI Dashboard.
Communications
Honours and awards may be recognized via departmental and divisional communications as well as at U of T Celebrates, which highlights awards received by faculty as well as by alumni and staff. The VPRI works closely with U of T Communications to ensure internal and external coverage of major honours and awards for research, innovation, and creative professional activity received by faculty members. U of T Celebrates also offers the opportunity to suggest awards for coverage.
Universities Canada’s Global Excellence Initiative also recognizes Canadian winners of major international awards in an annual publication.
Recognition Practices & Criteria
Major national and international honours and awards for research, innovation, and creative professional activity are recognized institutionally with congratulatory letters and, when public health guidelines permit, celebratory events such as U of T Salutes!.
Units are encouraged to report awards via our Faculty Award Reporting Form to ensure faculty receive recognition. Awards that meet the criteria for recognition include the following.
- All international honours and awards for research achievement or creative professional activity, excepting article/paper awards, lecture awards, and honorary degrees (due to difficulty in consistently tracking the latter award types)
- Fellowships and awards from Canada's national academies (Canadian Academy of Engineering, Canadian Academy of Health Sciences, and Royal Society of Canada); the Tri-Councils (Canadian Institutes for Health Research, Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council, and Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council); the National Research Council; the Medical and Science and Engineering Halls of Fame; the Bank of Canada, Canada Council for the Arts, and E.W.R. Steacie Foundation
- Honours granted by the Governor General or federal or provincial governments, including Orders of Canada and Ontario
- Lifetime achievement awards from and peer-nominated or elected fellowships in Canadian scholarly associations
- Awards from Canadian scholarly associations that represent the preeminent national recognition in a particular discipline
Academic divisions and units may have additional recognition practices and events for recipients of honours and awards and are encouraged to do so!
Honours & Awards Performance Indicators
U of T uses several measures to assess and celebrate our national and global performance in research recognition through honours and awards. In addition to our broad recognition criteria described above, these measures include the following.
- University of Toronto Honours and Awards Performance Indicators are comprised of significant national and international academy fellowships and awards that are open to faculty from a range of disciplines and in which annual performance is a meaningful metric. A chart of the University’s share of these recognitions relative to other Canadian institutions, as shown below, is published annually in the VPRI Annual Report.
- Prestigious international research awards identified in the Global Excellence Initiative awards inventory as important for global recognition of Canadian research talent.
Awards on the Performance Indicator and Global Excellence Initiative lists are included in the University’s UTORid-accessible Honours & Awards Opportunities Database with the Award Type tags “U of T Performance Indicators” and “Universities Canada Award Inventory”.
VPRI encourages divisions and academic units to identify any additional honours and awards that may be useful indicators of international or national research recognition in particular disciplinary areas, and to record and report received awards to VPRI (via the Faculty Award Reporting Form) to support institutional assessment and celebration processes.
- Track research honours and awards received by U of T faculty
- Coordinate celebratory coverage and institutional recognition practices
