University of Toronto Lester B. Pearson International Scholarship

The Lester B. Pearson International Scholarship is the University of Toronto's most prestigious undergraduate award for international students. Around 37 scholarships are offered each year, recognising students who show exceptional academic achievement and creativity together with strong leadership.

It is one of the very few full-ride undergraduate scholarships realistically open to Nepali school leavers, which is why it is worth planning for early.

The scholarship covers tuition, books, incidental fees, and full residence support for four years. In practice, this removes essentially the entire cost of an undergraduate degree at the University of Toronto.

It is tenable only at the University of Toronto, across its three campuses, and only for first-entry undergraduate programmes.

Nepali students are eligible as international students who require a study permit. The key gate is nomination: your secondary school must nominate you, and each school can nominate only one student per year.

You must be in your final year of secondary school or have graduated recently, be coming directly from secondary school rather than another post-secondary institution, and begin at the University of Toronto in the following September.

Start by asking your school to nominate you; nominations typically close in mid-October. Then apply for admission to the University of Toronto by its deadline, and complete the separate Pearson scholarship application, usually due in early November.

Selection is holistic, so there are no fixed grade or test-score cutoffs. Recipients are notified between late January and April.