CREation Community Grants Program

Funding Summary

CREation is a multi-level funding program that will support strengths-based, community-focused and youth-led projects taking place in communities across Canada. Funding is dispersed through themed streams, which focus on specific funding gaps and needs in communities.

The Youth Empowerment Stream – Sprout will provide small grants of up to $2,500 to youth-led projects happening in urban, rural and remote communities across Canada. The focus of this stream is to fund new and emerging micro-projects that focus on increasing the resilience, engagement and wellness of youth. Projects must be led by 2+ Indigenous youth (ages 15-29). Grantees and youth will receive innovative mentorship, training and capacity-building opportunities throughout the project. The Youth Empowerment Stream Sprout can be used as a stepping stone to implementing a new idea or starting your work with a project idea. Grantees that receive funding from the Youth Empowerment Stream Sprout are encouraged to apply to the Youth Empowerment Stream Blossom ($5,000 grants) to continue to grow their projects and impact.

Funding Stream Priorities:

There is a priority in this stream to support:

• New and emerging Indigenous grassroots groups and collectives
• Projects that are testing and/or trying a new idea
• New groups who have never run a project before
• Groups who have never received funding from CREaton before

Project Focus Areas:

Projects should focus on providing programming, training or capacity-building opportunities for Indigenous youth. Below are some possible examples of eligible projects. These examples do not include every type of project that we would fund

• Programs for youth to participate in recreational, wellness and/or arts-based programming
• Cultural programming, including ceremonies, teaching circles and land-based activities
• Peer-led circles where youth can build relationships and participate in online activities
• Intergenerational programs, that provide youth opportunities to work with Elders, parents, families, children, etc
• Programs that increase youth leadership skills
• Professional development programs for members of a youth council/organization to increase their knowledge about organizational governance
• Projects that target making resources (such as mental health services) safer and more accessible

All funded projects engage more youth other than just project leaders.

Eligibility:

CREation will only fund grassroots Indigenous youth groups consisting of a minimum of 2 youths. Please note: for the purpose of this program, CRE defines Indigenous as status and non-status First Nations, Inuit, and Métis peoples in Canada, living both on and off-reserve.

Eligible groups and projects include:

• Unincorporated/grassroots youth groups/collectives/councils comprised primarily of Indigenous youth
• Emerging, incorporated youth groups (note: CRE defines “emerging” as groups that have an operating budget of less than $50,000)
• Projects must serve primarily serve Indigenous youth

Ineligible groups and projects:

• Individuals and/or projects that are not led by 2+ Indigenous youth
• Projects that are not youth-led (or where the majority of the leadership is 30+)
• Non-Indigenous groups and organizations
• Groups that have received more than $10,000 in funding from CRE over the past 12 months
• Projects taking place outside of Canada
• For-profit corporations

Ineligible Expenses:

CRE will NOT fund projects that are political in nature, or that involve distributing substances (i.e. alcohol, non-traditional tobacco, marijuana, illicit substances, etc).
Project leaders cannot receive honorariums of more than $500.

Review Process:

Applications will be reviewed by a Community Grants Committee that includes Advisory Circle members, community members, Indigenous youth and other knowledge carriers. All members will have experience running programs and initiatives, overseeing projects and offering community support. 100% of the review committee will be Indigenous, and a minimum of 75% will be youth.

Capacity Building:

Youth will be invited to participate in CRE’s Capacity Building Program. This program is geared towards strengthening skill sets around program administration, facilitation, and evaluation as well as providing opportunities to learn about program design, organizational governance and growth, personal development and youth leadership. Youth will have the opportunity to work toward a certificate in the program.

Reporting and Evaluation:

Grantees will be asked to submit one report:

Final Report (2 months after project completion): Grantees will submit a budget report and an evaluation report. Grantees will receive a copy of the evaluation report within the first month of their project start date.

Financial Oversight and Trusteeship:

Groups/councils/collectives with members who are over the age of 18 do not require an external funding administrator and, if successful, will receive the grant funds directly.

Successful applicant groups (with leaders aged 15-17) will require a local non-profit or trusted community member over age 18 to serve as their grant trustee. This trustee may be someone the applicants are already familiar with or CRE can support in connecting them with a willing organization or community member as well as with creating a trustee agreement that ensures youth will be supported

Release of Funds:

CRE does not issue cheques. Funding will be sent to grantees via a Plooto bank transfer/direct deposit. Grantees will receive funds within two weeks of submitting a signed funding agreement.

Timelines:

Stages			Winter Intake
Applications Open			November 1st, 2022
Application Deadline			November 30th, 2022
Decisions Released			January 31st, 2023
Project Start Date			February 1st, 2023
Project End Date			June 30th, 2023
Final Report Due			August 31st, 2023

Questions:

CRE encourages applicants to reach out if they have any questions. Please email gwen@canadianroots.ca to speak to a member of the team.

Funding Summary:

CREation is a multi-level funding program that will support strengths-based, community-focused and youth-led projects taking place in communities across Canada. Grassroots and incorporated youth groups/collectives are eligible to apply for funding to support community programs and projects while receiving innovative mentorship, training and capacity-building opportunities

The Small Funding Stream will provide funding of up to $15,000 to Indigenous youth-led projects and groups and non-profits that seek to create impactful community change and increase the wellness, resiliency and engagement of Indigenous youth. Projects must be led by 3+ Indigenous youth (ages 15-29) who are meaningfully involved in project guidance, planning, implementation and/or evaluation.

Funding Stream Priorities:

There is a priority in this stream to support:

• Indigenous grassroots groups and collectives
• Previous grantees who have only held grants in the Youth Empowerment Stream (Sprout and Blossom)
• Groups that have some experience running programming and projects, but are looking to scale to a new level or try something new

Project Focus Areas:

Successful projects will fall within the following areas:

• Assessment and Feasibility Studies
  • Projects will focus on assessing community and youth needs, doing feasibility projects and engaging the community in consultation.
• Arts and Culture
  • Projects that increase access to arts, art-based workshops, cultural knowledge, traditions and ceremony
• Innovation and Change
  • Projects will support youth groups in accessing capacity-building, knowledge mobilization and funding resources. Projects will focus on innovating healthcare systems, developing solutions to infrastructure and resource challenges (such as access to clean water and sustainable food sources) and increasing access to technology.
• Intergenerational Relationship Building
  • Projects will engage multiple age groups and should help to enhance the sense of community (i.e. projects where youth participate in programs with Elders, families, adults, etc).
• Resiliency Building
  • Projects will focus on organizational development in Indigenous agencies. The intention of this focus area is to increase leadership, governance, capacity and opportunity for Indigenous organizations to impact communities and systems. Projects can include organizational enhancements (i.e. training, website development, strategic plan development, consulting projects, purchase of supplies, etc).
• Youth and Community Wellness
  • Projects will focus on enhancing community wellness and can include one-off events or long-term programs and any type of programming related to wellness (i.e. workshops, teachings, gatherings).

Eligibility:

CREation will prioritize funding grassroots youth groups consisting of a minimum of 3 Indigenous youth. Please note: for the purpose of this program, CRE defines Indigenous as status and non-status First Nations, Inuit, and Métis peoples in Canada, living both on and off-reserve.

Eligible groups and projects include:

• Unincorporated/grassroots youth groups and collectives
• Small, incorporated youth groups (note: CRE defines a small organization as groups that have 1-8 full-time employees and an operating budget of less than $500,000)
• Youth Councils

Ineligible groups and projects:

• Individuals
• Projects that are not youth-led (or where the majority of the leadership is 30+)
• Non-Indigenous organizations
• Projects taking place outside of Canada
• For-profit corporations and businesses

Ineligible Expenses:

CRE will NOT fund projects that are political in nature, or that involve distributing substances (i.e. alcohol, nontraditional tobacco, marijuana, illicit substances, etc) and any activity outside of Canada (i.e travel, accommodations, food, etc)

Review Process:

Applications will be reviewed by a Community Grants Committee that includes Advisory Circle members, community members, Indigenous youth and other knowledge carriers. All members will have experience running programs and initiatives, overseeing projects and offering community support. 100% of the review committee will be Indigenous, and a minimum of 75% will be youth.

Capacity Building:

All funded groups will be required to take part in online training/skills development workshops on managing, facilitating, evaluating, and reporting on programs. There will be orientation sessions for all new grantees. All grantees will be assigned a CRE staff member and will have individual meetings with this staff member throughout the project.

Reporting and Evaluation:

Grantees will be asked to report twice on their projects.

Midterm Check-In (6 months into the project): Grantees will complete a short report and meet digitally with a CREation staff to talk through challenges and successes. Grantees will share updates on budget spending, completed activities and youth reach.

Final Report (2 months after project completion): Grantees will submit a final report (including a narrative report, the budget report, participant tracking sheet, program hour tracking sheet, etc) Grantees will receive a copy of the
final report within the first month of their project start date.

Grantees will have to collect data as a part of their reporting.

Financial Oversight and Trusteeship:

Successful applicants over age 18 do not require an external funding administrator/trustee and, if successful, will receive the grant funds directly.

Successful applicants aged 15-17 will require a local non-profit or trusted community member over age 18 to serve as their grant trustee. This trustee may be someone the applicants are already familiar with or CRE can support in connecting them with a willing organization or community member as well as with creating a trustee agreement that ensures youth will be supported.

Release of Funds:

CRE does not issue cheques. Funding will be sent to grantees via a Plooto bank transfer/direct deposit. Grantees will receive funds within two weeks of submitting a signed funding agreement.

Timelines:

Stages			Spring Intake
Applications Open			November 1st, 2022
Application Deadline			November 30th, 2022
Decisions Released			January 31st, 2023
Project Start Date			February 1st, 2023
Midterm Report			June 15th, 2023
Project End Date			October 31st, 2023
Final Report Due			December 31st, 2023

Questions:

CRE encourages applicants to reach out if they have any questions. Please email gwen@canadianroots.ca to speak to a member of the team.

Funding Summary:

CREation is a multi-level funding program that will support strengths-based, community-focused and youth-led projects taking place in communities across Canada. Grassroots and incorporated youth groups/collectives are eligible to apply for funding to support community programs and projects while receiving innovative mentorship, training and capacity-building opportunities. Projects must be led by 3+ Indigenous youth (ages 15-29) who are meaningfully involved in project guidance, planning, implementation and/or evaluation.

$25,000 will be provided to projects/groups that seek to create impactful community change and increase the wellness, resiliency and engagement of Indigenous youth.

The Land and Food Sovereignty Funding Stream aims to increase opportunities to participate in land-based programming, learn about food and medicines and engage with knowledge keepers. Projects in this stream need to be Indigenous-led and youth-focused, although community-focused and intergenerational activities can be run. The intention of launching this program in Fall 2022 is so that the grant can support a full-year project in 2023 that covers a full growing season, and provide opportunities for multi-seasonal opportunities to engage with and on the land.

Funding Stream Priorities:

There is a priority in this stream to support:

• Indigenous grassroots groups and collectives
• Groups that have experience running programming and projects, but are looking to scale to a new level or try something new
• Projects that have an appropriate scale and scope for the funding provided (i.e., engagement numbers and frequency make sense for the funding requested)
• Projects that are multi-dimensional (i.e., are doing more than just one thing, and are looking to improve wellness overall)

Project Focus Areas:

Successful projects will fall within the following areas:

• Community Gardens and Food Knowledge Programming
  • Projects that focus on increasing access to foods, knowledge about traditional and healthy foods and building skills around planting, growing and harvesting. Projects in this focus area can include: community gardens, initiatives to start family gardens, workshops about cooking, harvesting and preserving etc
• Digital Land Connections
  • Projects will support youth to access food and land teachings in the digital space. This can include online social media campaigns, videos, digital workshops, etc. Projects can be focused on sharing knowledge, but also on preserving knowledge from Elders and Knowledge Keepers.
• Land-based Camps and Programming
  • Projects will engage youth in participating in programming on the land. These can include overnight camps or workshop series. Projects will work to increase the youth’s connection to the land and knowledge of food and land teachings. Projects in this focus area can include: medicine walks, ceremonies, foraging activities, water-based projects (such as water walks), recreational land-based recreation activities (e.g., canoeing), language camps, traditional hunting and fishing and other activities.
• Sustainable Food Systems
  • Projects will focus on revitalizing traditional food systems, including increasing the knowledge of the community around preservation and re-emergence. The project can include activities such as improving soil health, mapping territory to identify risk factors (such as chemical runoff, and invasive species), learning the stories of food, planting projects, and protecting water ecosystems (wild rice revitalization, etc.).

Eligibility:

CREation will prioritize funding grassroots youth groups consisting of a minimum of 3 Indigenous youth.

Please note: for the purpose of this program CRE defines Indigenous as status and non-status First Nation, Inuit, and Métis peoples in Canada, living both on and off reserve.

Eligible groups and projects include:

• Unincorporated/grassroots youth groups and collectives
• Small, incorporated youth groups (note: CRE defines a small organization as groups that have 1-8 full-time employees and an operating budget of less than $500,000)
• Youth Councils

Ineligible groups and projects:

• Individuals
• Projects that are not youth-led (or where the majority of the leadership is 30+)
• Non-Indigenous organizations
• Projects taking place outside of Canada
• For-profit corporations and businesses

Ineligible Expenses:

CRE will NOT fund projects that are political in nature, or that involve distributing substances (i.e. alcohol, nontraditional tobacco, marijuana, illicit substances, etc) and any activity outside of Canada (i.e travel, accommodations, food, etc)

Review Process:

Applications will be reviewed by a Community Grants Committee that includes Advisory Circle members, community members, Indigenous youth and other knowledge carriers. All members will have experience running programs and initiatives, overseeing projects and offering community support. 100% of the review committee will be Indigenous, and a minimum of 75% will be youth.

Capacity Building:

All funded groups will be required to take part in online training/skills development workshops on managing, facilitating, evaluating, and reporting on programs. There will be orientation sessions for all new grantees. All grantees will be assigned a CRE staff member and will have individual meetings with this staff member throughout the project.

Reporting and Evaluation:

Grantees will be asked to report twice on their projects.

Midterm Check-In (6 months into the project): Grantees will complete a short report and meet digitally with a CREation staff to talk through challenges and successes. Grantees will share updates on budget spending, completed activities and youth reach.

Final Report (2 months after project completion): Grantees will submit a final report (including a narrative report, the budget report, participant tracking sheet, program hour tracking sheet, etc) Grantees will receive a copy of the
final report within the first month of their project start date.

Grantees will have to collect data as a part of their reporting.

Financial Oversight and Trusteeship:

Successful applicants over age 18 do not require an external funding administrator/trustee and, if successful, will receive the grant funds directly.

Successful applicants aged 15-17 will require a local non-profit or trusted community member over age 18 to serve as their grant trustee. This trustee may be someone the applicants are already familiar with or CRE can support in connecting them with a willing organization or community member as well as with creating a trustee agreement that ensures youth will be supported.

Release of Funds:

CRE does not issue cheques. Funding will be sent to grantees via a Plooto bank transfer/direct deposit. Grantees will receive funds within two weeks of submitting a signed funding agreement.

Timelines:

Stages			Spring Intake
Applications Open			November 1st, 2022
Application Deadline			November 30th, 2022
Decisions Released			January 31st, 2023
Project Start Date			February 1st, 2023
Midterm Report			July 15th, 2023
Project End Date			January 31st, 2024
Final Report Due			March 31st, 2024

Questions:

CRE encourages applicants to reach out if they have any questions. Please email gwen@canadianroots.ca to speak to a member of the team.

Funding Summary:

CREation is a multi-level funding program that will support strengths-based, community-focused and youth-led projects taking place in communities across Canada. Grassroots and incorporated youth groups/collectives are eligible to apply for funding to support community programs and projects while receiving innovative mentorship, training and capacity-building opportunities. Funding of up to $25,000 will be provided to projects/groups that seek to create impactful community change and increase wellness, resiliency and engagement of youth.

The Shared Struggle and Solidarity Stream aims to strengthen solidarity between BIPOC (Black, Indigenous and People of Color) youth and provide relationship-building opportunities. Projects in this stream will need to
engage at least two groups, one of which must be Indigenous. Projects can be up to 12 months in length. Projects must be led by 4 youths that represent the communities they will be working with.

Group Leaders and Project Reach:

The focus of this funding stream is to bring together BIPOC youth from different backgrounds. Successful projects must bring together Indigenous (First Nations, Metis and/or Inuit) youth AND Black and/or POC youth.

Projects must bring together 2+ different communities. Projects that only bring together Indigenous youth (and do not engage other Black and/or POC youth) will not be eligible for funding in this stream.

A minimum of four youths must be identified at the application phase as project leaders. At least two of the project leaders must be Indigenous to Canada. The other youth leaders should be representative of other communities that are engaged. For example: if a project was bringing together Indigenous and Newcomer youth, two leaders should be Indigenous and the other two should be from the newcomer community/communities being engaged.

Funding Stream Priorities:

There is a priority in this stream to support:

• Grassroots groups and collectives
• Groups that have experience running programming and projects, but are looking to scale to a new level or try something new
• Projects that have an appropriate scale and scope for the funding provided (i.e., engagement numbers and frequency make sense for the funding requested)
• Projects that are multi-dimensional (i.e., are doing more than just one thing, and are looking to improve wellness overall)

Project Focus Areas:

The intention of this stream is to provide youth opportunities to collectively grow, create, heal and cause change. Successful projects will fall under one or more of the following areas:

• Sharing Knowledge and Culture
  • Projects that focus on building community between diverse groups through the sharing of knowledge and culture as a pathway to relationship building. Activities should be focused on both groups sharing their culture and community. Activities could include the following activities: storytelling, dance workshops, cooking workshops, feasts and gatherings, art workshops, recreation/games and other activities.
• Learning History and Lived Realities
  • Projects will bring together youth to learn about each other’s history, lived reality, barriers and resilience. This can take the form of sharing circles, speaker series, gatherings, workshops/sessions, etc. The focus in this area is on helping youth to understand each other better and to build an understanding of the differences and similarities between groups.
• Reclaiming and Rebuilding
  • Projects will focus on giving youth the tools to address systemic and community barriers they face through skill-building sessions and programming around mobilization, organizing and advocacy. Activities can include spaces where youth learn skills around lifting each other’s voices, building allyship, advocating for change, bringing together community and collectively visioning a more equitable future landscape.
• Changing Systems
  • Projects will focus on creating system-level and community-level change, including creating safe(r) pathways in system navigation, disruption and dismantling of oppressive systems and taking tangible steps toward making organizations and community spaces more accessible to BIPOC youth. Examples of a Changing System Project could include bringing youth together to create better pathways in accessing employment or education services; providing training and advocacy around equitable health care access, etc.

Eligibility:

CREation will prioritize funding grassroots youth groups consisting of a minimum of 3 Indigenous youth.

Please note: for the purpose of this program CRE defines Indigenous as status and non-status First Nation, Inuit, and Métis peoples in Canada, living both on and off reserve.

Eligible groups and projects include:

• Unincorporated/grassroots youth groups and collectives
• Small, incorporated youth groups (note: CRE defines a small organization as groups that have 1-8 full-time employees and an operating budget of less than $500,000)
• Youth Councils
• Projects must focus on bringing together two diverse groups, one of which must be Indigenous
• Project leadership must have at least 2 Indigenous youth, and be representative of the communities the project is bringing together

Ineligible groups and projects:

• Individuals
• Projects that are not youth-led (or where the majority of the leadership is 30+)
• Non-Indigenous organizations
• Projects taking place outside of Canada
• For-profit corporations and businesses
• Projects that are only bringing together Indigenous youth (and not youth from other communities)

Ineligible Expenses:

CRE will NOT fund projects that are political in nature, or that involve distributing substances (i.e. alcohol, nontraditional tobacco, marijuana, illicit substances, etc) and any activity outside of Canada (i.e travel, accommodations, food, etc)

Review Process:

Applications will be reviewed by a Community Grants Committee that includes Advisory Circle members, community members, Indigenous youth and other knowledge carriers. All members will have experience running programs and initiatives, overseeing projects and offering community support. 100% of the review committee will be Indigenous, and a minimum of 75% will be youth.

Capacity Building:

All funded groups will be required to take part in online training/skills development workshops on managing, facilitating, evaluating, and reporting on programs. There will be orientation sessions for all new grantees. All grantees will be assigned a CRE staff member and will have individual meetings with this staff member throughout the project.

Reporting and Evaluation:

Grantees will be asked to report twice on their projects.

Midterm Check-In (6 months into the project): Grantees will complete a short report and meet digitally with a CREation staff to talk through challenges and successes. Grantees will share updates on budget spending, completed activities and youth reach.

Final Report (2 months after project completion): Grantees will submit a final report (including a narrative report, the budget report, participant tracking sheet, program hour tracking sheet, etc) Grantees will receive a copy of the
final report within the first month of their project start date.

Grantees will have to collect data as a part of their reporting.

Financial Oversight and Trusteeship:

Successful applicants over age 18 do not require an external funding administrator/trustee and, if successful, will receive the grant funds directly.

Successful applicants aged 15-17 will require a local non-profit or trusted community member over age 18 to serve as their grant trustee. This trustee may be someone the applicants are already familiar with or CRE can support in connecting them with a willing organization or community member as well as with creating a trustee agreement that ensures youth will be supported.

Release of Funds:

CRE does not issue cheques. Funding will be sent to grantees via a Plooto bank transfer/direct deposit. Grantees will receive funds within two weeks of submitting a signed funding agreement.

Timelines:

Stages			Spring Intake
Applications Open			November 1st, 2022
Application Deadline			November 30th, 2022
Decisions Released			January 31st, 2023
Project Start Date			February 1st, 2023
Midterm Report			July 15th, 2023
Project End Date			January 31st, 2024
Final Report Due			March 31st, 2024

Questions:

CRE encourages applicants to reach out if they have any questions. Please email gwen@canadianroots.ca to speak to a member of the team.

Q: What do we mean by “Youth-Led”?

A: All CREation grants require that a minimum of 2 (sometimes 3, depending on the stream) Indigenous youth aged 15-29 design and run the project. This means the youth leads come up with the idea and structure of their project, complete the application, attend necessary meetings with their CRE grant coordinator, attend two mandatory workshops, plan and run the project, take charge of their project evaluation, and serve as primary contacts for their project. If that sounds like a lot, don’t worry! We’ll explain more and we encourage youth teams to have support from adults too. Successful applicants will also be assigned a CRE Grant Coordinator to support them along the way.

Sometimes youth groups will apply to do a project in partnership with a larger organization and while that would still qualify, the project itself would still need to be meaningfully youth-led as outlined above.

Q: What do we mean by “Indigenous organization/group”?

A: CRE is committed to ensuring that funds from this granting program are going into the hands of Indigenous-led groups, organizations and collectives. When we refer to an Indigenous organization, we require that they meet the following criteria:

Incorporated organizations/registered non-profits must meet all of the following three criteria:

• A mission/purpose, mandate and vision statement that outlines your organization’s commitment to working with Indigenous communities.
• At least 50% of the organization’s Board of Directors are Indigenous and/or the organization is staffed and led by primarily Indigenous people.
• The organization uses an Indigenous model/practices to serve the Indigenous community.

Grassroots groups and collectives must meet all of the following three criteria:

• At least 50% of participants in programming run by the group are Indigenous (work is Indigenous-focused).
• At least 75% of staff/organizers are Indigenous.
• The group uses Indigenous practices to serve the Indigenous community.

Q: What do we mean by “trustee”? 

A: The CREation granting program allows a group or collective to hold up to $30,000 in grants in a group leader’s personal bank account. However, if funds are larger than $30,000 and the group is a collective or grassroots, they will need to find an incorporated organization to support by trusting the grant. A trustee holds the grant funding for the grassroots or collective group, assumes the financial responsibility for managing the funds, and ensures that the project deliverables are completed. In addition, the trustee may choose to take a small admin fee for holding the responsibilities outlined above — at CREation you can have the admin fees covered in your grant if you decide to add it to your budget when applying for funding. A grassroots or collective may also choose to have a trustee for $30,000 and below funding. This option is okay and is the choice of the collective or grassroots group leaders.