Am I too late to get research experience before applying for a master program (Canada)

Question

I mistakenly waited too long before I really looked into general expectations before graduate school applications. Research experience was something I always saw only as a bonus to applications if you were able to get any. Recently I have been reading up on the subject more and many things I have been seeing seem to heavily indicate I really should be having some form of research experience to show interest in/preparation for graduate school.

My current situation:
I am a Canadian student currently in a 16 month long SE internship that will end August 2020, after which I will be finishing my last year of University.

I plan to apply for a masters program at U of Waterloo fall of 2020 for the computer science quantum information program

Overall GPA: 3.91 (last 2 years probably increases it by 0.01)
TA experience: was a TA for two CS courses, believe I can get good LOR from these professors
Worked experience: 16 month internship in a general development position
not related to my field of interest
Research experience: None

Since I will be working until august, and applying by december, I don't see it as a possibility I can get research experience in time, especially before contacting possible supervisors. Is there any advice that can be given to attempt to improve this gap? I am currently trying to heavily study up on the relevant material, but this is informal and doubtfully worth much outside of conversations with supervisors, if it gets there.

I appreciate any help, and I'm sorry for another "grad school chances" thread. (I am not expecting an answer on whether I have a chance as I know that is not a question that could be answered)

Answer 1

I don't know any specific expectations in Canada but I doubt the expectations about research experience are very high when applying for a Master. Also you seem to assume that informal experience doesn't count, but it probably does: for instance you could do a small project, e.g. reproducing state of the arts results for a problem of interest and analyzing the results. It might not count as much as a formal research internship but it certainly qualifies as research experience. If a professor accepts to guide you in such a project and gives you a good LOR at the end, then it's virtually equivalent to a research internship. At least that's how I would interpret it, but you should discuss this with somebody involved in this particular Master programme.