Project Grant Program – Individuals and Collectives

Taylor Poitras: Okay, awesome. Well, we’ll get started then. And Richelle, you’re also going to record. Let me know if you have any issues doing that.

Okay, awesome. Welcome to the Project Grant Program, Individuals and Collectives information session. All right. The purpose of this recording is to share information and context about the Project Grant for the 2025 grant year. That said, the most important information about this program is included in the program Guidelines and the assessor Terms of Reference. So whether you watch this recording or not, please read through the documents in full before applying and reach out early if you have any questions or need support.

The primary contacts for this program are myself, Taylor Poitras, and Richelle Bear Hat. Our roles and contact information are shared on this slide. If you have any questions about the program, please feel free to contact either one of us.

And for those of you who may not be familiar with Calgary Arts Development Authority, commonly referred to as CADA for short, we’re the City of Calgary’s designated arts development and municipal granting organization. We’re mandated by the City of Calgary to steward public taxpayer dollars for the public good for the benefit of all Calgarians. We believe in arts-led city building and fostering a sustainable and resilient arts sector which we do primarily through making grant investments and providing opportunities to individual artists, artist collectives and nonprofit arts organizations here in Calgary.

We acknowledge that the land we gather on, Mohkinsstsis, is the ancestral territory of the Siksikaitsitapi — the Blackfoot people — comprising the Siksika, Kainai and Piikani Nations, as well as Treaty 7 signatories, the Tsuut’ina Nation and the Îyârhe Nakoda Bearspaw, Chiniki and Goodstoney First Nations. Today this land is home to the Otipemisiwak Métis Government Districts 5 and 6 as well as many First Nations and Inuit from across Turtle Island.

We acknowledge that there has been art, music, dance, storytelling and ceremony on this land since time immemorial, and it is in the spirit of this land and its people that we do our work.

I also wanted to take a moment to talk about CADA’s Commitment to Equity. This is an ongoing and neverending commitment and learning journey, but it’s important to acknowledge that systems like granting and public funding are usually designed in a one-size-fits-all way, meaning that they’re designed for the dominant culture and are rooted in colonial Western European academic systems, which creates barriers to access for many artists in our communities who are seeking and deserving of support.

One obvious example of this is that we currently share our programs and accept applications in an online written format in English primarily. This alone creates technological, linguistic, communication and cultural barriers, just to name a few.

As a public funder, we have a responsibility to ensure equitable access to public funding. We envision a city where all artists have the freedom, agency and platform to share and amplify their stories, art, cultures and experiences, a city where Calgarians of all backgrounds can access, create and participate in art as part of their everyday lives.

To that end, we are dedicated to addressing and working to eliminate institutional inequity in our programs, policies and practices. Our staff are accountable to ensuring that lines of communication are welcoming, clear and open, and that our application and assessment processes are fair and deeply considerate.

While we have been continuing to expand and improve processes and policies around equity, accessibility and accommodation, we still have a very long way to go. We aim to continue building relationships and learning from our communities, particularly those most directly affected, about the specific challenges that exist in granting and working to create more equitable systems for everyone.

We’ve also identified equity priority groups and adopted a specific equity measure for some of our programs, including this one, which I’ll speak about later on.

So how does CADA’s Commitment to Equity translate or apply to you as artists and potential applicants to our programs?

When applying to public grant programs like this one, we ask artists to consider concepts like nothing about us without us, a concept and a value that has been around for a very long time now, and I believe grew out of the 1990s from disability rights activists. In this context, it’s the idea that if you’re creating work about or for a specific community, that community needs to be actively engaged, ideally from the beginning, and there needs to be a thoughtful, intentional and reciprocal relationship with clear permissions, benefits and value for those communities.

We value and honour lived experience and the intersectional identities and unique perspectives of different people and communities.

When applying to grant programs, it can be helpful to pause and ask yourself: why this, why now and why me? Be very mindful about the projects that you choose to undertake and how you go about undertaking them and engaging with others.

Connected to this concept, there are things that CADA will not tolerate or fund, such as hate speech, cultural appropriation or active exclusionary behaviours. So please be aware that any applications that contain this won’t be supported.

And when it comes to evaluating applications, this is something we also ask our peer committees to consider: Are applicants being thoughtful and considerate of the work they make, who they make it with and for, and how they make it and why.

So, we’ll expand on that a little bit more when we talk about the program considerations for this grant.

So, we understand that our programs and processes do create barriers to access for many artists and organizations that are wanting to apply. In recognition of those barriers, our Applicant Support and Accessibility Policy is available for those who may need support from program staff, or financial assistance to access support from somebody outside of CADA. This could include support for any part of the granting process, whether that be understanding our programs, who’s eligible, and deciding if you want to apply or not, creating and submitting an actual grant application, or support after receiving a grant such as reviewing and understanding your investment agreement, sharing any project updates, or submitting a final report.

So examples of accommodations are translation of written materials into other languages, transcription of verbal meanings or audio and video recordings into a written document, language interpretation, video or audio applications—this means that if you would prefer to answer questions verbally, you can submit an audio or a video recording of yourself, or our staff can help record your responses using an online platform like Zoom, as well as general grant writing assistance. So, we will work one-on-one with applicants and develop accommodations through conversation and check-ins.

Our team can assist you over the phone, in person or online, and help is available for applicants even if they decide not to apply to the program.

In addition to this, staff will do our best to provide support or share feedback with you over the phone, video or email. Just remember to reach out early, we can only guarantee feedback on your draft application up to 10 business days before a program deadline. So, for this program, that would be before May 1, 2025.

To help with managing volume, we’re also hosting weekly virtual open office Q&A style sessions throughout the month of April and May. There will be one 60-minute online open office per week leading up to the day before the deadline.

These virtual open offices are offered on different days of the week at different times of the day to help accommodate different schedules, so please take advantage of these if any questions arise for you throughout the process of applying.

During these 60-minute sessions, staff will basically be hanging out on Zoom in a room, answering any questions you might have about the project grant and providing applicants with support.

Some artists really like to just come and hang out the entire time and listen to other people’s questions simply to learn. And some folks prefer to just pop in and out real quick to ask their own specific question, and yeah, the registration for these links is on the website in the same place that you would have found the link to register for today’s info session. Just email us if you can’t find those links.

And we also understand that our staff might not always have the skills or capacity to fully support all applicants’ needs. So, if you’re an applicant who faces any barriers that make it difficult to access our programs, you might wish to seek out personal one-to-one assistance from somebody outside of CADA to help you with the application process. And if that’s something you need, CADA can directly pay that external support person for the hours that they spend helping you with your application. So that could include artists who identify as D/deaf or hard of hearing or having a cognitive, developmental, or physical disability, folks living with mental illness or facing language, geographic or cultural barriers, or facing technological barriers, so something may be related to limited internet or computer access as well, and any other additional barriers that may not be listed here.

So, you can get assistance from anyone that you’re comfortable working with. We can sometimes recommend professional service providers, but ultimately, it’s your responsibility to select a support person or a service that you wish to use. We want you to have trust and comfort with the person that you choose to support you. That could be a professional service provider, an artistic peer or a friend or a family member, and they could assist you with things like language translation, transcription, editing, application development, so maybe help with framing your ideas and concepts or organizing support material, and again, that could be through any part of the process, so applying, submitting a final report, etc.

We understand that costs might vary depending on the type of service that you’re accessing or the support that you’re getting, so those hourly rates or total hours might vary. The maximum that we can provide is $600, and we just ask that the support person provides an invoice to CADA with a breakdown of their hourly rate, the number of hours, and the total request amount. And you can simply call or email us ahead of time to let us know if you’re interested in paid application assistance, you won’t need to disclose any specifics or details about the barriers that you face or that you experience. For example, we don’t need to know if you have a formal diagnosis or anything like that, all we want to know is that you’re experiencing accessibility related barriers and that you’re interested in accessing this kind of support, and we will make a note on your file as well if you’ve been approved for that so that you don’t have to continually request that over and over.

Yes, and there’s details in the policy that kind of go over what to include in an invoice and a little bit more detail on this, but you can reach out if you have any questions at all from staff.

All right. So the Project Grant Program provides one-time project funding for a specific project, activity, or initiative to Calgary-based individual artists artist collectives, cultural workers, or collaborations with artists, which basically means individuals who are working in the arts and culture sector who maybe aren’t artists themselves, but they’re undertaking a project that primarily involves and supports artists. So please read the guidelines for a full definition of each of those categories before applying. I won’t read them all off today, but we have, in the guidelines, a definition for each of those. And just keep in mind the program isn’t accepting applications from arts administrators, agents or managers, production companies, registered for-profit corporations or businesses, or registered not-for-profit organizations. We do have other programs to support nonprofit arts orgs, but this is just a list of folks that we’re unable to support through our grants.

Applicants may be working in any artistic discipline at any stage of practice. While activities do not have to take place in Calgary, eligible applicants must be Calgary-based. So that means that you primarily live and work in Calgary, so for at least six months of the year. You should be able to demonstrate that the majority of your work is accessible to the citizens of Calgary and that you have a meaningful and ongoing relationship with the city and its artistic communities.

If you’re not currently based in Calgary, please contact staff to discuss your eligibility before applying.

We acknowledge that there are many artists who might be new or returning to the City of Calgary, and might not be familiar with grant programs or the local arts community. So, if you’re a newcomer, immigrant, refugee or re-emerging Calgary artist and you have questions or concerns about eligibility or navigating the grant process, please know that our program staff are available to help guide and support you.

It’s also important to note that you do not need to be a Canadian citizen or a permanent resident to receive a CADA grant, but you do need to be able to report the grant to the Canada Revenue Agency.

We welcome applications from those working in all artistic disciplines and their various cultural forms. This includes, but it’s not limited to: art services, arts education, art for social change, circus arts, community and social practice, craft arts, curation, dance, D/deaf arts, digital arts, disability and/or mad arts, film, inclusive arts, Indigenous arts, interdisciplinary practice, literary, media, multi-disc, music and sound, opera, orchestra, performance, public art, theatre, or visual art, and I’m sure there’s more. So yeah, all disciplines.

And what can you apply for? So, applicants may apply to this program for one project or one distinct phase of a project. So please ensure that you’re being clear about what phase of the work that you’re applying for, especially for like a larger or longer-term project that might have multiple stages or phases. And if you have questions about the project phases you want to include, please contact us to chat.

Projects might include research, so maybe research projects to help inform your artwork, your process, your approach. It could be creation or production of work, so developing new work, adapting previous work, experimenting. You might apply for professional development and learning, so maybe participating in a course, class, workshop, residency, training, a mentorship, attending a networking or industry event or a conference. You might be applying to present or share work with the public, so, you know, sharing, distributing, selling your work through exhibitions, installations, events, performances, presentations, touring, releases, publishing and the list goes on.

And then as well as marketing and promotion, so activities related to publicity or outreach, branding, marketing your work and your practice, networking or industry events, etc. So, if you have any questions about other potential project activities, please contact staff to chat before applying. There’s also a list of activities in the guidelines that we won’t fund so that are ineligible, which you can review as well.

Any project you apply with should have a clear start date and a clear end date, with a specific set of activities, processes and goals attached to it. And just a reminder that while the applicant must be Calgary based, projects can take place online or in person locally, nationally, or internationally. Total funding available for the program this year is $3.1 million, which is an increase of $600,000 compared to last year, and that’s just in recognition of the volume of applications we’ve been getting and this being our largest, biggest program for individuals and collectives.

Individual artists may apply for up to $20,000 towards their project and artist collectives may apply for up to $25,000. These maximum request amounts were increased last year, I believe, just in recognition again of inflation, higher costs year over year, and our desire to invest in artists with more meaningful grant amounts.

Not all projects will require the full max request amount, and I’ll talk a little bit later on about the best ways to approach developing a project budget as well. That said, if everyone who applied to the program was to request the maximum grant amount available, we would be able to fund a minimum of 124 applications, or actually the minimum would be 124 to 155, depending on the mix of individuals versus collectives. That number is likely to be higher given that request amounts won’t all be the max, so they’ll vary.

While we cannot say for certain what the volume of applications will be for this year, it has increased over the past few years since the pandemic, even doubling at one point or two points. So for context, in 2023 and 2024 last year, we received just over 500 applications, and we were able to support 30 per cent, 32 per cent. So that was the success rate for 2023 and 2024. It was about 160 plus applications at between $2.3 and $2.8 million, depending on the year.

Okay. Timeline. So, this is an overview of the program timeline this year. The guidelines were published on March 19 and applications opened a week later on the 25th. The deadline to apply to the program is May 14, 2025 before 4:30 pm MT, Mountain Time, not midnight. Don’t email me after 4:30 and say, I thought the deadline was midnight, it’s always 4:30 at CADA, and the reason is so that we can be available so that the staff don’t have to work into the wee hours of the evening, but we can be in the office answering last-minute calls or tech issues and trying to troubleshoot with folks.

The server does get quite busy on the day of the deadline, so please try to submit early if you can. It’s always safer to submit in advance just in case you have a tech issue or something comes up, you get sick, you have an emergency, things like that.

We also have a deadline extension policy with information about requesting an extension.

After the deadline, applications to the program will be reviewed and evaluated by peer assessment committees until early September. This assessment period allows staff time to review applications for completeness before assigning them to the committees, and it gives ample time for the assessors to read applications, score them online, and meet multiple times with their committee in order to make final recommendations. And more will be shared about the review process in a few slides.

Notifications of the grant results will be sent over email in mid-March, letting applicants know if they were successful or not, and confirming grant amounts. So, if you don’t see an email by September 17, please reach out. And then funds will be distributed directly after results go out between late September throughout October. Funds are released after grantees sign and return their grant investment agreements.

And since the grant results and the funding won’t occur until September or October of 2025 at the earliest, applicants should keep that in mind when planning. So before applying, consider your own timeline, cash flow and circumstances. If your project will already be done before, oh, sorry, yeah, before the results and funding is released, please ensure that you’re able to cover the costs on your own and be aware of the possibility of not receiving a grant. If you cannot undertake the project without first confirming and receiving funding, then please ensure that your project takes place after the funding is scheduled to be released.

All right. And then another note here, just keep in mind that we are unable to fund fully retroactive projects, which means that your project may already be underway before you submit your application, which is, you know, the deadline’s May 14, or you might finish your project before the grant results go out, but you can’t apply for a project that will be fully complete before the deadline of May 14. So, in other words, we can’t fund something that is fully and completely retroactive and done before you applied.

Projects funded through the program should be complete by the end of next year, which is December 31, 2026. And successful grantees will be required to complete a brief final report to share an update on their activities, any learnings and how the grant benefited their practice, along with an updated budget with actuals. So, it’s very important to keep track of receipts, contracts, invoices, payments and things like that so that you can clearly report on where the grant funding was spent to both CADA as well as the CRA at tax time.

Final reports are generally due 60 days after the stated project end date in your application, and if any significant changes regarding our program timeline have to occur, we will notify all applicants as soon as possible.

All right. Application eligibility does vary by program, so always read the guidelines for the program you’re applying to. Some important eligibility rules related to the project grant this year are as follows. So, first, applicants may not have more than two open grants with CADA, including grants for which a deadline extension has been approved. So as long as you’ve completed and submitted your report for a past grant, it’s no longer considered open, even if staff have yet to review and approve your final report, so there’s more information about that in our Open Grant Policy.

If you have questions, if you’re not sure how many open grants you have, just reach out and we can confirm with you. You also must be in good standing if you wish to apply. That basically means that you can’t have final reports past their due date for prior grants. If you do, you’ll need to submit the report before applying or be granted an extension on that final report.

Applicants may submit only one application per program deadline. Individual artists may be involved in more than one application, either as a participant in another artist’s application or as a member of an artist collective. So, that’s okay.

Please try to apply with the correct account. So, if you’re an individual artist applying for an individual project, use your individual account and artist collectives must apply using a collective account. And if you don’t have one, you have to register for one, and if you have any questions about that, let us know, you do need to use a unique email address for each for your individual versus your collective.

A project may only be submitted by one applicant per program deadline. So that means that multiple members of a group can’t submit for the same project to the same CADA program. CADA also cannot fund the same phase of a project or activity more than once, regardless of calendar year. So please do not apply to more than one CADA program for the same project or phase of a project.

So, if we already funded the production phase of your film, we can’t fund more of the production phase of your film, but we could fund post-production or marketing or other activities related to that same project that are the next phase.

And please note that if you are awarded funding from another funding source, so something like AFA or Canada Council, and if that other funding source fully covers your proposed project expenses, you won’t be able to also accept funds from CADA for those same project expenses, and we also won’t allow you to modify your original proposal or application. For example, we won’t allow you to increase your overall budget and costs or expand the scope and scale of your project because we want to honour what you submitted and what the assessors reviewed and approved. So just keep that in mind if you’re applying to multiple funders for the same project.

Okay, I think that’s it. Please reach out if you do have any questions about eligibility. Or again, if you want us to check the system for how many open grants you have.

All right, program streams. So, we do stream applications in the project grant to help manage volume and to group applications that are more similar than not together in assessment. We also use program streams to help design the makeup of the assessment committees. In this program this year, this is a little bit new, we had a different way of streaming in past years, but this year we’re asking applicants to select one of the two program streams on the slide here, and the first one is for applicants who are applying for a project that primarily involves disciplines and practices that include dance, theatre, music, opera, orchestra, circus, performance, et cetera. So those kind of performing arts style disciplines.

Stream two is for applicants who are applying for a project that primarily involves or focuses on disciplines or practices such as literary, visual, arts, craft arts, curation, public art, digital arts, media arts or film. So those are kind of like more presenting style disciplines.

Assessment committees are going to be multi-disciplinary, and they’ll be made up primarily of artists who work within the disciplines that are outlined within each program stream. And this helps to ensure that there are multiple perspectives on the committee that are familiar with and have knowledge about the types of processes, approaches, ways of working and ways of presenting, sharing or performing work that are common amongst different kinds of disciplines or, common across different kinds of disciplines. If your project includes primary disciplines across both streams and you aren’t sure which one to select, you can reach out to one of us to discuss this before applying. So for example, if you’re a spoken word artist who feels like your practice is very much equal parts performance and literary, which would fall in stream one and stream two, we can discuss what the project that you’re applying for is primarily focused on and which maybe feels most valuable in assessment given the focus of your project. So for example, if you were applying to support the research and writing phase of your spoken word work, so writing the poetry, researching, developing those pieces, you might select stream one to ensure that you have some literary perspectives, whereas if maybe you’re applying to do a series of spoken word performances to a live audience, you might select stream two to ensure that there’s some performance perspectives on the committee.

That said, there’ll be a lot of multidisciplinary perspectives across both, and we’ll keep an eye on what kinds of projects and disciplines we see within both streams to try to ensure a good representation on the committees as well.

And yeah, the $3.1million pool of funding that’s available will be divided between these two program streams based on the number of applications that apply to each stream and the dollar amount requested within each stream.

All right, so Eligible Expenses. Funds from this program can go towards almost any expense that’s directly related to your project. So, when it comes to requesting expenses, just try to make sure that any expense that you’re including is directly related and necessary to undertaking your proposed project. If you include ineligible expenses, just be aware that they might not be included or awarded funding through the program. There is a full list of both eligible and ineligible expenses in the guidelines that are important to read through, but I’ll highlight just a few specific things here.

The first is a reminder that we do want to see artists paid for their work and their time, which includes yourself. So, depending on your project, it might also include compensating consultants, participants, Knowledge Keepers, mentors, collaborators and more. Things like artist fees, professional fees, per diems, honorariums and subsistence are all eligible expenses through the program, so when it comes to paying yourself or others through a grant, there are different ways that you might choose to frame or quantify those amounts. It’ll vary, depending, please reach out if you’re having any difficulties framing things or trying to figure out what to include or how to calculate.

Unlike some funders, we don’t have a specific cap or maximum on some of those expenses, since we just understand the cost really can vary greatly depending on the project and circumstances or the type of work that’s being done, the scope, the location, the length of time, all those things. So if you have questions about artist fees, subsistence per diems, honorariums, we do have a super helpful FAQ written out that helps to define some of those terms in the glossary, as well as like a write up on how to frame artist fees versus subsistence requests and you know which one to ask in different circumstances. So, you can read through that.

And I also would encourage you to reach out to other artists in the community who have experience, do your research and just try to ensure that the people involved are being paid equitably and that rates and amounts are mutually agreed upon and supported in your application.

And I will make a quick note here that sometimes there are standard minimum fee schedules that folks reference. And just keep in mind that those are minimum fee schedules, so you can pay more than they suggest if you have room in your budget, you can certainly consider that.

The second piece that I wanted to highlight is that in past years, we have always had a cap on how much of your grant could go towards the purchase of equipment, which is considered a capital expense or an asset because you own it and it lasts well beyond the duration of the project and it depreciates over time. That said, in past years, we’ve been increasing that cap year to year, and last year we decided to remove the cap altogether. That said, there are some important things to consider when you’re requesting equipment through a public grant program such as this, and I wanted to emphasize some of those.

So first off, removing the equipment purchase cap is an ongoing experiment. So just be aware that it could change in the future depending on evaluation and feedback that we get from artists and assessors.

Secondly, removing the equipment cap does not mean that you can or should request full $20,000 or $25,000 solely for the purchase of new equipment. I would say that you’re unlikely to be successful if the vast, you know, the majority of your grant simply asking to invest in expensive equipment purchases. As it does state in the program guidelines, any equipment that you’re requesting must be specific and directly related to the completion and success of your proposed project. So not just benefiting your general overall practice, but the project itself. So that means that similarly to any expense in your budget, you’ll need to make a case for how this equipment is directly related, necessary, or relevant to the completion and success of your project. We do understand that there will be long-term benefit to owning the equipment in terms of supporting your overall practice, future projects and ongoing development, but just be sure to also speak to how this equipment will impact the project that you’re proposing in this application. For example, will the equipment improve the quality of the work that you’re creating for the project? Will it improve the efficiency or reduce the time it takes for you to undertake that work? Does it help you to meet a minimum standard within your discipline or industry in order to achieve a goal that you have? Is it required to undertake a specific training course or mentorship that you’re participating in? So those are just some examples. If it’s relevant, you might also speak to your rationale for purchasing the equipment rather than renting it, given the goals, scope, length of your project or the availability of rentals or the cost of renting versus purchasing.

Thirdly, please keep in mind that it might also be important to consider if you have the knowledge and experience to be purchasing a specific piece of equipment at this time. So, what’s your level of readiness or commitment to owning that equipment? Have you ever used it before? How do you know it’s the correct or best suited equipment for the project? For example, if you’re brand new to filmmaking and you’re asking to include the purchase of an expensive camera, assessors might have questions around if you’ve already operated the camera before, if you’ve done adequate research, is it available for rent during those shoot days? Could you rent it first, build up your knowledge and skills before investing in owning that camera? So just some things to think about.

And then the final piece I want to highlight is that while course fees are eligible, this refers to individual courses or continuing education courses that don’t count towards a credit, diploma or degree granting program. So that means you can’t pay for your diploma or your degree. So, if you’re taking courses in pursuit of that or making artwork related to those programs, we’re not able to cover costs associated with that. So, if you do have any questions about expenses, please reach out.

I’ll keep going a little bit more. So, where to apply? We accept applications through an online grant platform, which is called Smart Simple. This can be accessed from the CADA website under log in, which is always in the upper right-hand corner of our website, no matter what page you’re on, and it is also linked in multiple areas of the program guidelines as well. You can bookmark the portal log in page for convenience whenever you’re actively working on grant applications as well.

If you don’t already have an account with us, you’ll need to create an account and set up your user profile before you apply. As mentioned, if you’re applying as a collective rather than as an individual, make sure you have a separate collective account that you can apply through. If you have already applied to CADA before, log in as usual. If you can’t remember your password, click Forgot Password to reset it. And you can also reach out to us if you want us to look up what accounts you have in our system or make any changes to passwords or information.

When you log in, you’ll notice that there is a section called My Profile. Please ensure that your profile information is complete and up to date. Collectives will also have a secondary profile area called My Organizational Profile, that’s where you’ll go to fill out any collective information. It says organization, but it really means collective. These profiles include information about your artistic practice, current contact info, years of practice, the disciplines that you’re actively working in, as well as a place for your artistic CV or resume and your artistic practice statement, which I’ll talk about later on.

Parts of your profile that you save here will be automatically transferred over to any grant application that you submit, so make sure that it’s accurate and up to date before you submit a grant application to any program. If you make changes to your profile after submitting a grant application, those changes won’t be reflected in the application.

When you log in, you’ll also notice a section called Open Opportunities, and that is where you’ll find any open grant or public art applications currently available. There you should see the Project Grant Program for Individuals and Collectives. So, you would click Apply, and then begin application to open a draft application form. Make sure you take the time to read all the instructions in the application form, they’re very important, they help give guidance for what to include, how to make changes, and where to find any other information as needed. There will be multiple tabs in the application that contain all the different parts of the application form, and just remember to save as you go. You can save and return to your draft application as much as you like before submitting. And after you have opened and saved a draft, you won’t need to go back to open opportunities. Instead, you can always find your application under the Drafts tab of the homepage when you log in.

And when you’ve completed your application or you think it’s maybe close to being completed, you can hit the Save and Validate button and that will have our platform check over your application to make sure that you aren’t missing any mandatory fields or sections.

Once everything does look good to go, you can then hit Submit before the deadline and the system will still validate and kind of review your application before you submit just to make sure everything is there. You should then receive an email notification that’s informing you of your successful submission. If you don’t see that email, please reach out to let us know.

Okay. So, I’ll go over this application checklist and then maybe we’ll take a small break after that.

So, the application checklist in the application, I mentioned that there’s a couple tabs. Under the project overview tab of your application, this is where you’re going to include some basic information about the project. So, the name of your project, a brief one-sentence description of the project, which acts as kind of like an identifier or a label for your grant, so you’ll basically tell us what you want to do with the grant in 25 words or less. For example, I’d like to research and develop a new play and do a reading with a small group of peers for feedback in early 2026. The total amount that you’re requesting from this grant will also be entered here. You’ll include the start and end date of your project or the phase of the project that you’re applying for, just remember to make sure that it falls within the eligible date range for this program.

You’ll also indicate the artistic discipline that is most relevant to this specific application, and there are many options, so there is multidisciplinary if you feel like your project doesn’t fall into just one category, and you’ll indicate as well the stream that you’re applying to, so stream one or stream two, which we went over earlier. And this tab also includes the three written questions in the application, so project description, artistic impact and community connection. Each of these sections is maximum 500 words, just keep in mind that the word counts are simply guides and they should not be considered the goal, they’re just a max. So if you do not need to use up the full word count to make your case, don’t feel compelled to kind of fill the space or repeat yourself over and over. However, it is important to provide enough information for assessors to clearly understand your practice, your project, goals, what you want to do. So, try to be thoughtful, clear and specific so that it’s really easy for someone reading your application to understand and connect the dots.

Okay, we can keep the recording going maybe over the break just so we don’t forget to activated it again. But we’ll take, I’ll stop sharing for just a moment. And we’ll edit this part out so that folks are still anonymous if wanted. But let’s take till 6:30, just a little bio break here for folks and as well as the ASL interpreters if needed, and then we’ll resume at 6:30. And if you want, I mean, I guess I need a break, but we’re still gathering questions in the chat. I know Richelle’s been keeping an eye and maybe responding where possible, but maybe we’ll save the questions for the end. But you can still feel free to pop them into the chat anytime.

Okay, see you in a few minutes. Thanks all.

We’ll jump back in pretty quick here. I let a couple people in over the break. So we just took a little bio break amidst the presentation. So I’m going to jump back in.

Let me just try to share my screen again. All right. Can someone confirm if they can see the screen again? I need a verbal. Okay, so we’ll jump back in.

All right, the next tab is the Planning tab, which contains a place to enter your project budget and upload budget support materials, a project timeline and any other general support material. And I’ll share more detail about each of these later on.

Your artistic statement is located in your profile and it’s basically an introduction to you and your overall artistic practice and goals. Artist statements shouldn’t be long or difficult to understand. It should be a concise and helpful overview that speaks about who you are as an artist, what you value, what kind of work you make, how you make it. So maybe processes or approaches and what’s important to you and why. So your artist statement will likely change over time as you and your practice do, and just remember that context matters, meaning the type of artist statement that you would typically submit to a company, a gallery show or as program notes is maybe going to look different than the type of artist statement you’ll share with the grant committee. This introduction provides helpful context for how assessors understand the activities that are proposed in your application and how those connect to your overall artistic practice and goals.

Another piece that is located in your profile is your resume or curriculum vitae/CV. This is a clear list of experiences relevant to your art practice and can include things like education, trainings, workshops, past work, media, awards, grants received, etc. So be sure to include information or sorry, important information such as dates, locations and a very brief description of each experience if it’s not apparent.

A resume or a CV can be a helpful tool for assessors to view alongside your artist statement to better understand you, your practice and where you’re at in your career. That said, don’t let a resume intimidate you, if it does. There are many valuable experiences and entry points into a life and a career in the arts, and it’s okay to have gaps in your practice or times where you weren’t creating or working in the arts for whatever reason. It also does not have to only include professional experiences. You can include anything that helps people understand how you got here. A little bio or a blurb at the beginning is okay too, if you want to share some context. And many assessors, or sorry, many artists have their resumes available on their websites, which can be a helpful way to see the various formats and ways that resumes are structured, particularly for different kinds of disciplines. For the purposes of our programs, simplicity and readability are much more important than fancy formatting.

If you’re applying as a collective, include your collective CV that outlines your history of working together, or if it’s kind of a newer collective or ad hoc kind of collective, you can include all the members’ individual resumes in a single PDF instead.

All right, so the project description. This is where you’ll describe your project, including what will occur, when it will take place and where it will take place. In your project description, try to be clear, straightforward, and specific. Assessors should very clearly understand what you want to do with this grant after reading this section. This really sets the stage for their understanding of the rest of your grant. You may want to include some information or rationale for how you came to decide the what, when, and where of your project. For example, you could speak to why the dates you’ve chosen are the most feasible or how you came to decide the location or venue for your project, you might touch on who’s involved in this section, but there is dedicated space to speak more about who else is going to be involved or impacted by the project, if anyone, in the community connection section. This should really be a helpful, relatively detailed description of the project details. But just keep in mind that you will have more space to elaborate or to dig deeper into the, you know, who, how and why in other sections of the application.

And the next section is the artistic impact written section. This is where you’ll describe your artistic goals for the project and what success will mean for you. So consider how the project might impact your artistic work, practice or discipline. Depending on your project, you might talk about artistic goals that you have for the actual work itself, you know, or around the artistic processes, techniques or approaches that you’re going to be utilizing. Think about how, does this work connect to past work you’ve done or not. You might talk about professional development goals related to learning or growth within your artistic practice. Are you continuing to build, hone and practice skills that you currently already have? Or is this a relatively new area for you in terms of learning, knowledge building and skill development?

You might talk about discipline-specific goals or impacts that the project might have on the disciplines and communities that you’re part of, like artistic communities. So, what might this project be contributing to, building off of, exploring for the first time? How might it fit within an artistic discourse or milieu if that’s relevant?

So, as you can see, there are many examples and types of artistic impact or growth that you might talk about. Just be sure to tell assessors what is most important to you and why when it comes to this project.

Consider how the project connects to your overall artistic practice. You might ask yourself those questions around why this, why now? How will the project allow you to achieve your artistic goals? How will you measure success, learnings or impact? What is helpful and meaningful to capture given the project, your goals and where you’re at currently in your practice? Those are just some guiding questions. But this is not about saying what you think the funder or assessors want to hear, but really about defining what success actually means and looks like to you.

Think about what your artistic goals are, what you need to achieve them, and how you will know if you’ve achieved them. It’s great to start thinking about this early on, developing your own systems of evaluation can be highly beneficial to personal artistic growth and development and guiding your practice into the future.

The Community Connection section is the last written area. Again, a maximum of 500 words. This section asks you specifically to describe the people or communities that are connected to this project and why you’ve chosen them, and it asks you to talk about what your community-related goals for the project are and what success will mean for you. There’s also a little note in the application that you’ll see that says, if you are the only person involved in the project at this stage, please speak to potential future connections or goals and or who you generally make your work for and why.

 So, I do find that artists sometimes freeze at this question or maybe overthink it, so I’ve added a definition as well for like, what do we mean when we say community? So, for the purpose of our programs, we define community as those who view participate, collaborate, engage, or benefit from your work. So, depending on your project, this might include audiences, participants, students, other artists, collaborators or partners, institutions or venues, mentors or teachers, neighbuorhoods or specific communities that are aligned around maybe a shared identity or goal or topic. It could refer to discipline specific communities, geographical communities, religious or cultural communities, communities that have a shared interest, value, aesthetic or curiosity. So again, as you can see, this can include many things, but it doesn’t have to include all of these things. It’s really intentionally broad so that every artist can find a way to respond to this question, regardless of the context of their project.

So, there is space to speak about how this project will impact your relationships, networks, or communities, either during or after completion of the project. Your community-related goals can be about deepening and strengthening current relationships, forging or creating brand new relationships, or working towards building future aspirational relationships later on. So depending on your specific project or the phase that you’re applying for, you might answer this question really differently. Some projects might only involve, or sorry, some projects may involve a lot of engagement and sharing with the public at this time, while other projects may only have a few collaborators or a mentor involved, while others may be very solitary at this point in time. And all of those options are okay, we deeply value how a project might allow you to better connect with your communities in the future just as much as we care about how a project might immediately involve impact or engage communities.

So, for projects that involve actively working with, engaging or sharing with other people, this is where you might describe those relationships: How they’ll be engaged or considered throughout the project or why this project is important to them. The depth and quality of your relationships is just as important, if not more important, than the breadth or quantity of your relationships. We don’t expect you to be everything to everyone, but we do want to see how you’re considering others in a thoughtful, respectful and informed way.

So, this is a reminder here that if your proposed project intends to make work about or for a specific community, it will be essential to speak directly about your current relationships and connections to said community. For example, are you part of that community yourself? If not, how are you engaging that community? Are you including, valuing and respecting those perspectives in a meaningful way? Are those involved being equitably compensated, etc.

For projects that are perhaps more solitary and don’t directly engage or involve anyone else or that don’t have an element of sharing the work publicly right now, this is where you might describe your general artistic relationship to different communities such as you know, who you make your work for, how you’re considering them during the creation or research process, or how this project might impact your ability or capacity to better connect share or build relationships with audiences or, you know, build your sense of community in the future.

So, like artistic impact, consider what your own measures of success might look like. Evaluating the success of your relationships or your community goals should be meaningful to you and those involved. So, while quantity and numbers can tell a meaningful story, you might also be interested in qualitative measures like audience response, feedback that you receive from a workshop or a mentor, or the way you felt experimenting with a new form of engagement or sharing. So, consider what feels authentic and meaningful to you.

All right, so your project timeline or project plan should clearly show the committee how you’re going to accomplish your project in a little bit more detail than your project description. So, try to outline all important artistic or community related tasks, events, activities, milestones, deadlines, process periods, whatever’s relevant. Make sure you include dates, locations, who else is involved, or a description of each item if it’s not apparent, and ensure that you’re including enough detail to clearly demonstrate what needs to happen, when and how.

Please make a note of things that are confirmed or pending where necessary. If something important changes from maybe pending to confirmed after you’ve submitted your application, let us know and we might be able to make updates to your application or let the committee know, depending on where we’re at in the process. It may be helpful as well to include some thought around why this is the most reasonable timeline for you and the project, particularly to help assessors understand feasibility, especially if not all of them might be familiar with your discipline or your own personal capacities and approaches and processes. So if it’s helpful to give some context to, you know, say this timeline might look really long to some folks, but the way that I work, you know, you can give a little bit of context to kind of say, you know, if you have like rationale for why it looks the way it looks or for some folks, you know, you might go This timeline might seem really tight and a little bit challenging to folks, but I have a plethora of experience doing projects like this, I know that this is how I work and I’ve done it in this kind of timeline in the past. So even a little bit of context can be helpful, depending on the project.

There’s no standard template for your timeline. You can use any format as long as it’s converted into a PDF document when you go to upload it. So, depending on your project, you might be using more of a calendar format or a dated list format or you might use some kind of chart or diagram. The most important thing, though, is that it’s clear, intuitive and easy to read.

Okay, and the project budget. So, the budget template is built directly into the grant application online. The budget will ask for a list of relevant project expenses and a list of any relevant project revenues. You might only have one revenue item, which is the amount that you’re asking for from CADA, or you might have other revenues contributing towards the cost of your project. Just be sure to account for the entire scope of the project that you’re applying for and make sure that your budget tells the same story as your grant application, there shouldn’t be surprise expenses that don’t really seem to align with what you shared in your application and in your project timeline. They should all tell the same story.

Our advice for approaching a budget is to first consider what opportunity or project might fall within the general range of the grant program and the budget for what you or what’s available within the budget. So, we would suggest budgeting for what you realistically need to complete the activities. So, start by imagining how the project would run ideally and then build your budget off of that rather than starting at the maximum amount available and building a budget backwards. If you add all of your true estimated expenses up and you go over the maximum amount that you’re able to request from this grant, then you might reconsider the scale or scope of your proposed project and look for where you can reduce costs or maybe break out your project into phases, or think about other funding sources or revenue sources that might supplement your overall budget. So, this could include other grants, sponsorships, donations, in-kind support, personal contributions or earned revenue like ticket sales if it was applicable.

So yeah, grants are just one option for supporting your project and its costs. And if you do have other revenues, include those as well and just indicate if they’re confirmed or pending at the time of applying.

Your budget should balance to zero so that it’s very clear how all your project expenses are going to be covered by project revenues, whether it’s the CADA grant or other revenue sources as well. As you enter dollar amounts into our budget template, it does automatically do the math for you. Each line item in your budget will have a note section that I strongly recommend using to give additional information about each line item, whether it’s an expense item or a revenue. Include a description of what it is, what it includes and any helpful calculation or breakdown or context for how you got to that number. Assessors will be reviewing your budget to determine, you know, make sure all your expenses are eligible based on the guidelines, so just make sure that you’re only requesting expenses that are required to undertake your project and activities. And just be clear about each expense item. Include that level of detail so that we know exactly what it is. If you just say travel $5,000, and then you give us nothing, we don’t know if that’s a flight, if it’s gas, does it include on the ground transportation? So, you really want to describe each item and how you got there.

So, for example, some other examples indicate if something is purchased or rented. So, if you’re asking for equipment, you could specify if it’s being bought or just rented temporarily, if you’re outlining fees for different artists or other professionals, include their name, role, a breakdown of their payment, was it a flat fee, an hourly rate, a quote? Is it based off of a fee schedule like CARFAC? If you request subsistence, which is support for your monthly ongoing expenses like rent, utilities, food, childcare, those kinds of things. If you are making a request for subsistence, make sure to break out what it includes, and the time period that it’s covering, and how you calculated it. So if it was for rent, food, utilities over a period of two months at $2,000 per month, that’s $4,000 total. So you kind of give an explanation and a bit of a breakdown.

Assessors often wish that budgets had more clarity and detail provided so that it doesn’t leave room for questions or confusion. So, try to be clear and specific about each item in your budget.

Next slide. So, there are going to be two different areas for support material. The first one appears right below the budget, and it’s a space where you can upload any budget-related or budget specific material or documentation that’s going to help support, backup or kind of demonstrate your budget items and estimates. So, for example, you might include research costs, like maybe a screenshot. You could include quotes, invoices, standard fee schedules or maybe correspondence that is confirming a rate, or if it’s relevant, you know, past examples of revenue, if you’re projecting ticket sales or something in your budget.

So while budget support is optional, it’s highly recommended, especially for things like artist fees or any kind of payment to somebody else involved in the project, as well as like any larger budget items like equipment purchases or rentals, I don’t know, flights, accommodation, course fees, you know, those bigger, I guess, bigger items that are easier to kind of back up.

For expenses like subsistence, as I mentioned earlier, you do not need to upload a PDF to prove what your utility bill or your rental cost is. You also don’t need to get super granular when it comes to things like materials, you can give an idea of the materials that will be included, but we don’t need to see the potential price of every tube of paint that you might purchase.

Yeah, so those things can sometimes be described just within the budget notes, you know, with a little description as opposed to having like, you know, a screenshot of every of every canvas that you want to purchase or that kind of thing.

Yeah. All right. And then the general support material, this is where you’ll provide any additional material that will support and strengthen your application and just help assessors better understand your practice or project or the planning.

So, there is going to be a list of allowable file types and file sizes. There are options to include PDFs, images, videos and audio files. You can also feel free to combine multiple PDFs into one to upload, if it’s all your I don’t know, letters of support in one, you can upload that as one PDF. So, feel free to organize it that way if you like. And you’re also welcome to include a description or briefly describe kind of what you’ve included if it’s helpful to add that context.

So, you might consider including things that either demonstrate the quality of your artistic work, so maybe examples of work, documentation of previous projects, information about your artistic process or background on the specific discipline that you’re working in, whatever you think would be helpful in that area. You might also include something to demonstrate your capacity to undertake the work. So perhaps examples of previous work or projects, planning documents, support letters, mock-ups or drafts for the project, if relevant. You could include items that demonstrate your research or planning for the project. So maybe you have like research findings or letters of confirmation, contracts or just like detailed planning documents. Those could be included. Or you might include things that help demonstrate the partnerships or the relationships that are related to the project. So that could be CVs or bios of your collaborators, or a letter of support from someone involved, or confirmations or correspondence that show a commitment or an interest from somebody else in the project.

But anyway, the material you include should basically just be relevant and meaningful to the application. So, you don’t have to include all of those things, just include what makes sense in the context of your project. Assessors do really appreciate seeing examples of your past or current work, so do try to include that specifically. It just helps them kind of get a better understanding of your overall practice. So those are definitely helpful to include, regardless.

And then lastly, just a note, to be considerate of the committee’s time, assessors will only be asked to review up to 10 minutes of support material for each applicant. They will be reading many applications, so just be respectful of how much additional material and documentation you’re including. Try to be succinct. You can help direct their attention to the most important elements of what you’re sharing. So for example, if you have a longer video included, you know you could direct their attention to the most important three minutes of that video if they don’t have time to watch the entire thing. Or if you’re a writer and you want to include a sample of your script, maybe don’t upload the entire script, but maybe an important excerpt or a sample of the writing instead or a synopsis. Something like that. Yeah.

All right. So, applications to the program will be reviewed by a committee made up of artistic peers, so individual artists and arts workers with experience and knowledge from a variety of disciplines and practices. And assessment committees are chosen to represent the broad diversity of Calgary and its artistic communities, that is including but not limited to: artistic discipline, gender, sexuality, age, religion, beliefs, nation, physical and neurological identities. The volume of applications received to the program will determine the number and size of committees that are required to fully assess the program. We pay assessors an honorarium to serve on any of our committees, the honorarium is outlined in the assessor terms of reference, which are linked within the guidelines. And yeah, maybe Richelle, if you have time, you could pop that into the chat as well, link to the Terms of Reference. I would encourage folks to read those just to better understand the responsibilities and expectations that assessors are asked to commit to.

Assessors are kept confidential and anonymous until next year when a full list of assessors is posted as part of our annual report. Assessors are required to declare conflicts of interest according to our policy, which means that they won’t be evaluating applications where there is a real or perceived conflict, so that might be their own application, or the application of a friend or family member or someone that they might materially benefit from the success of an application and those kinds of things.

Peer assessment committees help ensure that we are fairly and responsibly distributing public dollars to artists on behalf of the citizens of Calgary.

Oh my gosh, I keep trying to advance the slide. There we go. And the membership of our peer committees is chosen through public nomination, as well as staff expertise. So if you or anyone you know is interested in assessing any of our programs, there is a nomination form on our website. So, you can check that out there in the QR code or the link, and there’s a separate nomination form as well if you’re interested in serving on public art and their committees.

All right. So, we’re getting there. This is an important section. All projects are going to be evaluated and funded based on three program considerations. So that’s artistic impact, community connection, and planning. So based on the information that you provide in your application, the assessment committee will rate the level to which they agree or disagree with each of these considerations. So, there’s four ratings, there’s strongly agree, agree. Disagree or strongly disagree. Each program consideration will be weighted equally, and the score assigned to each rating will be consistent. So, for example, strongly agree will always equal the same number of points on the back end. And I’m going to go through each of those three considerations in more detail here.

So, the first is artistic impact. The applicant shows a clear and in-depth understanding of their artistic practice, artistic goals, and what success will mean for them. So how the assessors are understanding what artistic impact means and how you’re meeting this consideration is based on what you tell us about what is important to you and your practice, what your goals are and how this project will allow you to achieve them.

So, ensure that you’ve provided enough information and context for the assessors to draw these connections. It might seem obvious to you, but if you can provide a little bit of rationale or context, it helps fill in the gaps so that assessors don’t need to guess or make assumptions. So you should be able to be honest and show an awareness of where you are in your practice and career right now, where and how you fit or don’t or even maybe don’t fit into your artistic communities or disciplines, and what artistic quality, growth, or success mean for you? Being able to recognize the challenges or barriers that you might face as an artist can in fact help demonstrate potential, thoughtfulness and intentionality about the way that you’re undertaking your work. It creates an opportunity to see how an investment in your practice might in fact leverage you into finding solutions to those challenges. So while it can be very tempting to only paint a rosy picture to funders and to committees in a grant, actually demonstrating that you’ve taken the time to think and reflect on how you undertake your work or challenge your own assumptions, shows the committee how you are well set up to steward a public investment in an effective way.

So, as you saw, there is a specific section in the application where you’re able to talk directly about artistic impact, your artistic goals for the work for yourself and for the discipline. However, we are asking assessors to consider your application holistically. So that means that there may be other parts of your application that speak to artistic impact more indirectly. So, things like your artist statement, your CV, maybe some of the support materials that you’ve provided, like examples of work. All of that will be considered when evaluating artistic impact.

The second is community connection. So, the applicant shows a clear and in-depth understanding of the relationships and communities connected to this project, their community-related goals and what success will mean for them. And as mentioned, this can include future relationships and connections as well as those occurring during the project itself. So while we know that many artistic practices and projects might not necessarily put a primary focus on community engagement or relationships, we do want to open a conversation for every applicant to say what community means to them and how they’re thinking, or how they think their art contributes to that community, whether that be directly or indirectly during the project or later on. It’s important to reflect on who your communities and relationships are or who you’d like them to be and how you might either connect and engage or simply consider them during the project.

Defining your communities will allow you to better understand what it means to have an impactful relationship with them. So, reflect on why your project is important to those you’ve identified, whether they’ll be experiencing the work now or later.

If the project doesn’t involve creating or sharing work at all, then how does the project support or impact your ability to deepen or grow your relationships and connections to your communities in the future? And again, consider the program. What? Oh, I’m like, what did I write? Consider this program consideration holistically in your application as well. So, this consideration may also be supported in your application through things like your CV and support material.

All right, and planning is the third program consideration. So, the applicant has included enough information to clearly show what they want to do and how they will do it. There’s an in-depth understanding of what it will take to carry out the project and meet their goals. This is demonstrated by a clear, achievable, well-supported application. So, for example, the applicant has enough relevant experience or necessary supports in place, you know a feasible timeline and budget, suitable partners, collaborators or mentors, and things like that.

While the application is considered holistically, the primary elements that will relate to planning are your project description, budget, timeline, and some of your support material. These planning pieces should clearly outline who you’ll work with and why, how you’ll work with them, what it will cost, how much time it will take and what tasks and activities are required to meet your goals. So, you want to show that your project is achievable, well researched and well supported, especially when it comes to ensuring that those involved are being considered and taken care of within the planning elements, including yourself.

The application should have clear, detailed, thoughtful responses and include all relevant information required to create trust and confidence that the project will be completed as described and that the applicant will reach their goals. Assessors shouldn’t be left with a lot of questions, confusion, or doubt. They should feel that there is a clear sense of readiness and awareness within the application. I recommend keeping all three of these program considerations in mind throughout the writing process. And if even after hearing these descriptions, you’re still not sure, this is a great opportunity for our staff to kind of talk through a project with you and what you’re thinking about including in your written areas, and we can give feedback on your draft ahead of time if that’s something that would be supportive.

So how are grants awarded? The total pool of funding available is $3.1million. Assessment committees are going to be responsible for reviewing and scoring the applications that are assigned to them online according to those three program considerations we just touched on. Committees will then meet to discuss applications together, and they have an opportunity to talk about the applications, adjust their scores and make final recommendations. Program staff are responsible for facilitating these discussions and ensuring that the conversations are fair and appreciative and that assessors are acting within the group agreements and the process outlined in our terms of reference and in the program guidelines.

The overall committee’s final scores will result in a list of projects that are recommended for funding, and Calgary Arts Development staff will review those recommendations and finalize the funding list based on average total scores.

And just a note here that partial funding may be allocated, but primarily only if there are ineligible expenses within a project budget, or if a majority of the committee recommended less funding for a very specific reason. So, for example, if there was a very clear, strong case, or sorry, if a clear case was not made for a particular activity or expense and the majority of the committee did not recommend that expense, then you might receive partial funding in that case.

Another possibility is if we don’t have enough funding left in the pool to fully fund the last project. There might be partial, but we typically are able to find funding to fully top up that last grant. But that said, we try our best to avoid hamstringing artists with partial funding. We really prefer to fund fully as long as everything’s eligible. So, we will let you know if you are awarded partial funding what the reasoning was and have a conversation as well.

And another note here about tiebreakers. So, in the final 10% of funding, if there are applications that are tied but not enough funds in the grant budget to support all of those tied applications. Priority may be given based on the following considerations: First, projects that are proposed by artists belonging to an equity priority group, or in the case of a collective where the majority of the artists in the collective are equity priority groups, which I’m going to talk about on the next slides here.

We might also prioritize projects from artists who have not received a Calgary Arts Development grant before or within the past two years if it’s needed to continue to break a tie.

Okay, so how do we determine who is an equity priority group or belongs to that? Included in the grant application is a voluntary self-identification form. It’s one of the tabs, the first, I think it’s the second tab in the application form, and it will include optional questions that are based on equity priority groups that CADA has identified. These equity priority groups include Indigenous, Black, persons of colour, D/deaf persons, persons with disabilities, persons living with mental illness and two-spirit LGBTQIAP+ individuals. So, for details, please take a look at our Equity Priority Group Descriptions which are linked in the application and guidelines and right in the portal as well.

Applicants will be invited to fill out the voluntary self-identification form directly in the application, however, all questions are optional. Applicants that choose to self-identify as belonging to one or more of these equity priority groups will be automatically considered for the tie-breaking equity measure if it arises. Responses to these questions are not visible to assessors. So, anything you share there will not be visible to the folks reviewing the applications. Access to that information is limited to our Research and Impact team, as well as the grant program staff at CADA. And information collected in this section also is used to kind of help us track who’s applying, identifying gaps and ensuring that grants are being awarded in an equitable manner, and any information shared will only ever be shared in aggregate, so at a very high level and completely anonymous.

What is the purpose of equity priority groups? So, as we shared earlier in the presentation, CADA acknowledges that there are many barriers to access, and full participation in our society, sector, and in granting specifically, which have historically disadvantaged some groups over others. So, in order to help address underserved communities who have experienced barriers to funding and access to opportunities in our art sector, we have identified these equity party groups and adopted this measure.

Equity priority groups, policies and practices will continue to change and be adapted as needed based on ongoing evaluation, community engagement and feedback.

All right, we’re almost done. What time is it? Okay, so some general grant tips. You know, and I hope these are not insulting. I know they’re quite straightforward, but it’s just little reminders that I think can be helpful.

Read and follow directions in the form itself. We include a lot of instructions throughout the form to be helpful to users. So, for example, if it says to include only specific file types or to only upload a certain number of images or to stay within a word count, things like that, try your best to follow those instructions to make sure your application is eligible and within the guidelines.

Remember that you’re not expected to be everything to everyone, so your application is not necessarily going to benefit from trying to write or represent yourself in a way that you think assessors might want to see. Really write, I think, in the way that is most authentic to you, your practice, your goals and your communities.

Use plain language rather than academic language or maybe artists speak. That’s often much more clear and concise. It can be helpful to avoid jargon or technical language, remembering that assessment committees will be made up of Many people from different practices, backgrounds, experiences.

Don’t assume that they’ll understand your specific language or practice. If you are speaking about something that’s really unique to your discipline or your practice, be sure to define it or describe it. Assessors really appreciate being able to easily read and understand an application since they’re reading so many.

As I mentioned, it can be really tempting to paint a rosy picture of your practice, but having an appreciative sense of what challenges and barriers you might experience in your work and how you might move through those or how a grant might help you move through those, can really help demonstrate capacity, awareness, and potential, so it makes an application actually look stronger in a lot of ways.

Do your research. Make sure that you can back up what you’re stating in your application, that you’re not pulling numbers out of thin air, that you really know what’s required to undertake a project successfully and meet your goals, and find the supports that you need. If there’s a gap in something perhaps you’ve never done that type of editing process. Do you want to use the grant and bring on someone to mentor you through that process, or do you want to hire that out? It’s not something you want to ever do yourself. So, are you working with the correct people and collaborating and hiring out? The parts that, yeah, you’re not able to do yourself.

It can be helpful to also use the phrasing of the questions directly in your answer to make sure that you’re answering each question fully and not missing anything. Also, be sure to do a last edit or read over. Test your links and uploads. Make sure that you’ve uploaded the correct information and that things are working before you hit submit.

It’s also really helpful to have someone, or it can be helpful to have someone who might not be familiar with your practice or your discipline read over your application ahead of time. The questions that they might ask or ask or things they might share about your application after reading it could help uncover gaps or assumptions that you might be making in the way that you’re communicating. It can also be really helpful to have someone who’s well-versed in the discipline or practice that you’re applying within to look over your application. They might be able to point out red flags or gaps in your planning, budgeting, etc. So, lean on friends, family, or peers if you can. And you can also reach out to staff as well, as I mentioned, and yeah, start early. Ask questions along the way, we’re here to help. So yeah, it’s a learning process. Don’t give up, you know, there’s a lot of factors that you can’t control in granting. So, pay attention to the ones that you can and do your best and uh And yeah, and know that it can be a very competitive process depending on the program and the funder, but there is also a lot of support available for artists.

We hope that it’s a positive experience applying as well.

All right. Oh, sorry, I forgot about this last slide here.

Successful applications will receive an automated notification through the online grant portal with instructions on how to accept the grant and receive funding. So that includes reviewing and signing that agreement, which is sort of like a contract between CADA and the grantee, and it outlines all the terms and conditions of receiving a grant.

So, it is important also to consider the tax implications of receiving and accepting a grant. If you get a grant from CADA, we are required to issue a T4A tax form for the full grant amount in the calendar year that you receive payment. So, when you’re filing your taxes, you may deduct all reasonable grant expenses related to the project from the total grant amount. But in order to show the amounts of the grant that were spent out, you need to track all of your expenses, keep receipts, invoices, contracts, proof of payments etc., so that you can properly deduct those expenses. The CRA may request these things if you’re audited, and some expenses like subsistence or your own personal artist fee may not be considered deductible by the CRA, and applicants may be required to pay income tax on any amount of the grant that could be considered income or non-deductible.

Our FAQ has information and resources about artist grants and taxes, however, keep in mind CADA cannot give tax advice, so we highly recommend that you consult a tax professional or accountant when you’re planning your grant applications and preparing your taxes each year, which I still have to do. Successful grantees will also be required to complete a final report, as I mentioned, just to talk about the activities that happened, the budget and how much actuals were, and any learnings that you experienced.

Final reports are due 60 days from the project end date that you’ve indicated in your application.

All right. And this is just a little link to our newsletter if you want to stay up to date on any kind of news or information from CADA, things like more funding opportunities, public art calls, just learning about artists and all the things happening in our city and much more.

So that’s it. Here’s the contact info for the program again, if you have more questions that come up after today as you’re working on your application, consider signing up for those weekly open offices online, they’re a really great space to pop in and ask questions or hang out and listen to what other artists are asking as well.

That said, our staff are also available to answer questions as needed. So we’ll try to get to feedback requests in the order in which we receive them, so reach out early, May 1 is your deadline for requesting feedback, after that, we won’t be able to promise or guarantee that we can look at your application, but we will be available for quick, you know, questions and emails and phone calls up until the day of the deadline. Yes, that’s it. So, thank you so much for listening. That now concludes the formal part of our presentation.