Recruitment Process

My recruitment for graduate students (MSc, MA, and PhD) is primarily focused around the annual Mila application process, which typically takes place around December for students starting in September of the following year.

Fall 2027 cycle: The Mila supervision request process for Fall 2027 admission is currently open. I am not actively advertising positions, but I am open to applications from candidates who align exceptionally well with my research. If you believe you are a strong fit, you are welcome to apply through the Mila process.

I normally do not recruit outside of this annual Mila process. If, for any reason, you do want to contact me regarding an MSc, PhD, or internship outside of this process, title your email "Supervision inquiry – [MSc/MA/PhD/internship] – [start semester] – [Your Name] – [research theme]", but know that I cannot guarantee a reply due to the volume of requests I receive. Before reaching out, please also carefully check the language requirements listed in the Application Process section below — many programmes require B2-level French.

Research Opportunities

Students and postdocs interested in the following themes are welcome to apply:

• Linguistic and computational evaluation of large language models
• NLP for under-documented languages
• Machine translation of domain-specific texts
• Cultural and linguistic bias in AI systems
• Multilingual knowledge representation in neural models

Note: Some themes reflect established expertise (computational terminology, LLM evaluation). Others represent interests I am expanding (NLP for under-documented languages). Co-supervision ensures students receive diverse complementary expertise.

What I Look For

• Background: Strong foundation in computational linguistics, NLP, linguistics, or translation studies
• Technical skills: Programming experience (Python preferred), familiarity with machine learning concepts (or motivated to learn)
• Language skills: Proficiency in English and French; additional languages are an asset
• Research mindset: Curiosity, critical thinking, and enthusiasm for interdisciplinary research
• Research focus: Genuine interest in language as a central component of your research; if your primary interest is in the most technical aspects of machine learning or AI without a language focus, I may not be the right supervisor for you

Before You Apply: Important Information

About my supervision approach:

• I am an applied linguist with computational expertise. My research requires strong interdisciplinary skills.
• I actively seek co-supervisors with complementary expertise to ensure diverse perspectives and broader networks.
• All students must be based in Montréal (no remote supervision).

About applications:

• I can only respond to applications that clearly align with my research. Review my work carefully and explain the connection.
• Generic applications will not receive a response.
• Admission to an MSc, MA, or PhD in translation, linguistics, or computer science requires a relevant undergraduate background in one of those fields. If your previous studies are not closely related, you are unlikely to meet the programme's admission requirements regardless of research interest.

About funding:

• I only accept PhD students I can fund. All accepted students have full financial support (you need not secure funding before applying).
• Students are expected to apply for external funding (with my support) to supplement stipends and enhance CVs.

Application Process & Timeline

For PhD applicants:

My main recruitment path is the annual Mila application process (link). This process typically opens in mid-October with a deadline in early December for admission the following September.

Mila acceptance leads to one of three UdeM programmes (with almost guaranteed admission):

• Doctoral programme in Linguistics: Starting date September; French level B2 required
• Doctoral programme in Translation: Starting date September; French level B2 required
• Doctoral programme in Computer Science: Starting date September or January; no French required (though encouraged)

All students are affiliated with both Mila and UdeM.

Postdocs and visiting scholars can apply by email:

• CV
• Brief personal statement on research interests and proposed collaboration
• References (if available)

Current Students

Manuel Archambault (PhD Linguistics, started September 2026)
Co-supervised with Prof. Justin Royer
Topic: NLP for Chuj

Noah Tremblay Taillon (MSc Computer Science, started September 2026)
Topic: Machine translation with LLMs, with a focus on terminology translation

Konrad Brüggemann (PhD Computer Science, starting January 2027)

Past Students

PhD

Victor De Marez (2023-2024, co-supervised with Prof. Dr Tim Van de Cruys)
Topic: Bilingual lexicon induction as a probing task to explore cross-lingual lexico-semantic knowledge in language models
Note: Due to my emigration to Montréal, I had to discontinue my supervision. Victor is continuing his PhD at the University of Antwerp under supervision of Prof. Dr Walter Daelemans.

MA Theses

• R.D. (2024): Evaluation of EN-NL translation quality of ChatGPT vs DeepL for legal texts
• J.M. (2023, research internship): Linguistic information for sequential automatic term extraction
• G.F. (2021, co-supervised): Automatic term extraction
• A.D. (2021, research internship): Multilingual automatic term extraction from comparable corpora
• K.S. (2019, research internship): Monolingual term extraction features to link cross-lingual equivalents

BA Papers

• N.J. (2024): Comparison and evaluation of translation capabilities of ChatGPT vs DeepL
• L.T. (2019): Automatic term extraction with supervised machine learning
• Y.D. (2018): On the nature of terms and term annotation
• M.V.B. (2018): Quantitative research of automatic term extraction