Apply for funding for the Canada Service Corps Program – Micro-grants Diversity stream

From: Employment and Social Development Canada

Objectives

The Canada Service Corps (CSC) promotes civic engagement among young people from 15 to 30 years old through access to meaningful volunteer service that help them gain essential life skills and experience.

Objective of the CFP

The objective of this CFP is to continue to expand the CSC program and strengthen diversity. This goal is aligned with the Government of Canada’s commitment to youth programming and the pledge to equity, diversity and inclusion through the new Anti-racism Strategy. This CFP identifies the engagement of Indigenous and under-served youth as a key program focus and the need to increase the level of participation of these youths in the program.

This CFP will invest up to $42,675,000, over fiscal years 2022-23 and 2023-24 in Grants and Contributions (Gs&Cs) to provide multi-year funding to eligible organizations in the Micro-grants Diversity stream to deliver new micro-grants with diverse organizations.

Objective of the Micro-grants Diversity stream

The objective of this stream is to fund diverse organizations that are well-placed to reach and support youth in their communities, in particular Indigenous and under-served youth. These organizations would do so by delivering supports to youth and providing them with small, one-time cash payments (“micro-grants”) to carry out innovative short-term service projects. Youth participants would develop a budget plan and receive funds up to a maximum of $5,000 per participant to undertake their project and through this experience, would develop skills like leadership, planning and budgeting skills among others.

In this stream, Program Specific Questions are used to determine whether organizations meet the diversity-related eligibility criteria. These questions ask organizations to identify any Indigenous or under-served populations they serve. Organizations will then be asked to answer a yes or no question as to whether at least 50% of their leadership and 50% of their governance (if applicable) represents one or more of the groups that the applicant indicates it currently serves. These criteria allow organizations to demonstrate that their leadership and/or governance is primarily comprised of people from Indigenous and under-served populations (i.e. visible minority/racialized people; persons with disabilities; LGBTQ2 people; and, people from OLMC):

Leadership: minimum of 50% of executive management positions (Director, and above) reflect one or more of the Indigenous and under-served populations^{Footnote 1}
Governance: minimum of 50% of Board of Director seats (governance bodies) reflect one or more of the Indigenous and under-served populations.

Organizations in this stream will:

Support youth-led projects by soliciting applications and identifying potential recipients, assessing projects, supporting youth in their service projects, funding, and monitoring projects including how funds are spent
Provide a micro-grant of up to $5,000 per participant, or group of youth, who identify a project that needs a small amount of financial aid in order to cover project-related costs. Youth will be expected to take ownership of an issue, propose a solution and implement it at the local level.

Project proposals must describe:

How they will provide youth with the knowledge and tools to engage in service
How they will promote and deliver micro-grants
How they plan to reach/enrol and support Indigenous and under-served youth to meet the target of 50% Indigenous and under-served youth per project
How they will support youth in developing and delivering youth-led projects
How the organization will collect data and report on results
How they will manage the distribution of funds to youth to cover service project costs
If applicable, how they will plan to encourage youth to participate and successfully complete youth-led projects, including using methods and/or non-financial incentives

Project requirements

This section describes the mandatory requirements for projects in the Micro-grants Diversity stream. Your application will be assessed based on how it meets the requirements listed below.

Projects in this stream will be required to:

Take place in Canada
Target participation of 50% Indigenous and under-served youth;
Focus on one or more of the following service themes:
- Reconciliation
- Building an inclusive Canada
- Preserving the environment
- Promoting civic and democratic engagement
- Strengthening youth resilience
- Potential new themes that are youth-identified
Confirm that the organization can provide a safe and inclusive environment that is free from racism, harassment and discrimination for CSC participants as well as others in the organization
Collect data to inform the evaluation of the CSC program
Report on performance indicators
Provide participants with supports, such as mentoring/coaching, alumni activities as well as funding participant costs and supports, such as equipment or services that enable virtual service opportunities, dependent care, transportation, accommodation, mental health supports, specialized services or referrals to appropriate resources, arrangements or equipment for persons with disabilities
To mentor or guide youth in co-creating their micro-grant youth-led projects to both:
- Meet the needs and interests of youth
- Address a community volunteering need.

Eligible applicants must:

Confirm that organizations meet the diversity-related eligibility criteria, meaning that their leadership and/or governance is representative of the populations they serve.
- Organizations will be asked to identify the specific groups and sub-groups they serve. This includes: Indigenous people (First Nations, Inuit, Métis citizens); visible minority and other racialized populations (with sub-categories such as Black, East Asian, South Asian); LGBTQ2 persons, persons with disabilities, and people from Official Language Minority Communities
- Indicate whether at least 50% of their leadership and 50% of their governance represents one or more of the groups that the applicant indicates it currently serves
  - Leadership: minimum 50% of executive management positions (Director, and above) reflect one or more Indigenous and under-served populations
  - Governance: minimum 50% of Board of Director seats (governance bodies) reflect one or more Indigenous and under-served populations.
- Please note, if you select “No”, your organization will not be considered for funding, as this requirement is mandatory in this stream.
Have recent^{Footnote 2} experience working with or delivering programming to youth (aged 15-30), or
Have recent^{Footnote 2} experience working with or delivering programming to Indigenous and under-served populations; and
Have experience in running an intake process and assessing applications and
Have experience disbursing funds or making payments to participants or clients

Eligibility

This section describes how your application will be screened to determine its eligibility. Your application must meet the eligibility criteria listed below to apply for this program. Otherwise, your application will be deemed ineligible.

Eligible recipients

Eligible recipients are:

Not-for-profit organizations
For-profit organizations (provided that the nature and intent of the activity is non-commercial, not intended to generate profit, and supports program priorities and objectives)
Research organizations and institutes
Indigenous organizations (including band councils, tribal councils and self-government entities); and,
Municipal, Provincial and Territorial^{Footnote 3} entities, which includes institutions, agencies and Crown Corporations, Public health and educational institutions (i.e., universities, colleges, CÉGEPs, school boards/school districts)

Note to organizations located and operating in Quebec : Ministère du Conseil Exécutif (M-30)

The Quebec National Assembly adopted An Act respecting the Ministère du Conseil exécutif (M-30). The provisions of this Act include certain conditions on Quebec government bodies and certain other entities wanting to contract with the federal government. You may wish to consult the provisions of M-30 at the following website prior to submitting your Application for Funding to ensure compliance with the Act respecting the Ministère du Conseil exécutif (M-30). Any entity that is subject to the Act is responsible for obtaining such authorization before signing any agreement with the Government of Canada.

Eligible participants

In order to be an “eligible participant,” an individual must be:

A Canadian citizen, permanent resident, or has been granted refugee status in Canada; and
At least 15 years of age upon starting participation in the program and no older than 30 years of age at time of application.

Eligible activities

Eligible activities in this stream may include, but are not limited to the following:

Activities supporting the dissemination of information and knowledge
Activities that offer support for youth in the identification and validation of issues and priorities for community action
Activities that offer support for the implementation of strategies or actions to address community issues
Activities supporting the implementation of innovative methods of reaching Indigenous and under-served youth
Activities that explore, test and develop innovative solutions, best practices, capacity-building tools and methodologies (e.g. toolkits, resources, etc.)
Activities designed to support and facilitate youth access and participation in volunteer service opportunities (e.g. youth matching function to available volunteer experiences, etc.)
Activities designed to support the promotion and the benefits of civic engagement
Activities designed to support innovative approaches and delivery facilitating youth participation in civic life
Activities designed to support knowledge development and research on engaging youth in service
Activities designed to test methods to encourage youth to participate and successfully complete micro-contributions

Eligible expenditures

Eligible expenditures are those considered necessary to support the purpose of the funding. The following expenditures are eligible for your project in this Call for Proposals:

Overhead costs, normally up to 10%, including costs related to central administrative functions of the recipient organization that are drawn upon to support agreement activities (such as shared postage, telephones, information technology maintenance and head office support).
Costs of materials and supplies
Wages and mandatory employment-related costs (MERCS)
Training and professional development costs for project staff
Honoraria (program participants are not eligible)
Printing and communication costs
Professional fees, such as consultant, technical expertise, or facilitation
Domestic travel costs, not exceeding rates and allowances in the National Joint Committee travel directives
Participant costs and supports (such as living expenses, equipment or services that enable virtual service opportunities, mentorship, dependent care, transportation, accommodation, specialized services or referrals to appropriate resources, arrangements or equipment for persons with disabilities)
Recognition or completion certificates
Financial payments made to participants for eligible expenditures under youth-led projects

Where the recipient further distributes contribution funding to a third-party organization to carry out project activities, payments from the recipient to the third party to reimburse the latter for the above-listed types of expenditures incurred are also eligible expenditures.

Other eligibility requirements

You must complete the Program Specific Questions in the application to confirm if your organization meets the diversity-related criteria which are required to be considered for funding under this stream. If you do not wish to answer, or if these questions do not apply to your organization, your application will not be eligible for funding under the Micro-grants Diversity stream and will not be considered for funding.
Your application is received before the deadline of March 22, 2022 at 3:00 p.m. (ET).
Your application package is complete and contains all the required information.
Your project does not extend past March 31, 2024.
The funding amount you are requesting from ESDC does not exceed $3,000,000 per recipient per year.
The funding amount re-distributed through micro-contribution funding for a youth-led project does not exceed $5,000 per project participant.

Contact us

If you have questions about this call for proposals, send an email to NC-DGOP-POB-CSC-SJC-GD@SERVICECANADA.GC.CA. Please use the following naming convention in the subject line of your email when sending an inquiry: Organization Name-CSC Micro-grants Diversity stream-Question.

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Date modified:: 2022-03-22

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