REQUEST FOR PROPOSALS:
PATHWAYS TO LEADERSHIP: EMPOWERING NEWCOMER & RACIALIZED YOUTH IN
NL’S ARTS & CREATIVE INDUSTRIES
MULTICULTURALISM AND ANTI-RACISM PROGRAM (MARP)
Introduction
The Association for New Canadians (ANC) invites qualified external evaluators to assess
Pathways to Leadership: Empowering Newcomer and Racialized Youth in NL’s Arts and Creative
Industries, an initiative funded under Canadian Heritage’s Multiculturalism and Anti-Racism
Program (MARP). The evaluation will determine the project’s overall success, impact, and
sustainability and synthesize findings, resources, and best practices for stakeholders.
The project engages newcomer/racialized youth (18–34) through mentorships, workshops,
networking, cultural-competency training for sector partners, and a youth-curated exhibition;
end-of-project activities include comprehensive evaluation and knowledge-sharing.
Project Overview
Project Title: Pathways to Leadership: Empowering Newcomer & Racialized Youth in NL’s Arts &
Creative Industries
Timeline: October 31, 2025 to March 31, 2026
Location: St. John’s, NL
Scope of Work
The successful proponent will design and execute a mixed-methods evaluation that:
- Confirms outcomes using tools such as pre/post activity surveys, focus groups, and regular
check-ins; analyzes progress toward short- and medium-term results
– Leadership readiness
– Mentor/mentee connection quality
– Support youth to design and collect survey/focus-group data mapping systemic barriers to
entering the creative industries.
– Build a baseline of barriers; analyze patterns by demographic and sector.
– Inventory and assess industry tools, trainings, and resources for this demographic; identify
gaps.
– Track participant opportunities and progression (mentorships, internships,
gigs/exhibitions, employment, education).
– Evaluate project contribution to reducing identified barriers (pre/post comparisons,
stakeholder feedback).
– Lead knowledge sharing with Project Lead: synthesize lessons learned, highlight sector growth
areas, and provide actionable recommendations. - Measures key changes including participants’ knowledge/skills/confidence; tracks
mentoring pathways (e.g., internships/employment/exhibitions); and assesses adoption of
cultural-competency practices among arts organizations (with follow-up where applicable). - Verify youth co-design in practice—trace Youth Advisory Group (YAG) recommendations to
implement changes and effects on design/delivery; assess anti-racism workshop impact on
sector orgs (policy/practice changes, tool uptake, follow-on actions). - Synthesizes evidence into a clear, actionable final report and supports knowledge-sharing
with partners and community.
Key Deliverables:
– Evaluation Plan & Matrix (design, indicators, data sources, schedule).
– Data-collection tools (survey instruments; interview/focus-group guides).
– Analysis outputs (cleaned/anonymized datasets, codebook, synthesis notes).
– Final Evaluation Report (methods, findings against targets, lessons learned, best practices,
recommendations).
– Presentation(s) to ANC and stakeholders; support for public knowledge-sharing event.
Required Qualifications:
– Established professional in program evaluation/analysis (NL-based preferred).
– Demonstrated proficiency with statistical tools and qualitative analysis software.
– Strong communication and stakeholder engagement skills; sector-specific familiarity with
arts/creative industries is an asset.
Proposal Requirements:
– Please submit a concise proposal including:
– Approach & methodology aligned to the scope and timeline.
– Workplan with milestones from contract start to Mar 31, 2026.
– Team (CVs/roles) and two recent evaluation samples.
– Budget (fees, hours by task, applicable taxes/expenses).
– References (2–3).
– Conflict of interest declaration.
Submission Guidelines:
Proposals should be sent to [email protected] with subject “RFP – External Evaluation
(Pathways to Leadership)” no later than October 31 , 2025. Late submissions will not be
considered.
Evaluation Criteria:
– Proposals will be evaluated based on the following criteria:
– Experience and track record of successfully planning and executing similar projects.
– Overall cost-effectiveness of the proposal.
– Quality and alignment of proposed plan with the Project outcomes and goals
Legal Terms
– ANC reserves the right to reject all proposals submitted under this call or to cancel or amend
the RFP at any time without penalty or cost.
– ANC is not obligated to accept the lowest-cost proposal. Evaluations are based on the
criteria set in this call, including demonstrated expertise, methodology and overall value to
the organization.
– The successful proposal will be required to enter into a written agreement with the ANC.
– All information provided to the successful bidder to meet the deliverables of this project shall
be considered confidential.
– Any material, data or intellectual property produced through the project shall become the
exclusive property of the ANC.
– The terms of the contract and deliverables will be clearly stated in the signed agreement. A
failure to meet the set conditions of the contract by either party can lead to a termination of
contract. In the event of an early termination due to non compliance, ANC is only responsible
for paying for the completed work.
– In the event where the successful bidder/contractor is working with clients, then a
vulnerable sector check and criminal background check shall be required.
– The proponent must declare any actual or potential conflict of interest relating to the
proposal submission.