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Heritage Canada's Canadian Culture Online Program has posted a new call for proposals under their Gateway Program.  They are requesting that applicants forward this information to other groups to help ensure that this information is distributed as widely as possible to interested parties.

The Gateway Fund is a component of the Department of Canadian Heritage's Canadian Culture Online strategy (CCO), a framework to stimulate the development and production of Canadian cultural content on the Internet. Canadian Culture Online is pleased to announce a call for proposals under this fund that specifically targets the development of online access points that aggregate Canadian cultural content for educational purposes in the kindergarten to grade twelve (K-12) teaching environment, or the maternelle to secondaire teaching environment in Quebec.

 Projects funded under this call will develop online access points focussing on curriculum related themes that are relevant to K-12 studies, and maternelle to secondaire studies in Quebec, of a social and cultural nature, with advanced features that allow teachers to quickly search educational cultural content from multiple sources in a seamless manner, then easily identify and use the content that is relevant to their curricula.

The focus of this call is on the design and creation of these access points, and the coordination of parties that hold recently developed online educational cultural content. As such, the costs associated with the digitisation or development of cultural content will not be funded under this call.

Eligible applicants include Canadian not-for-profit and public sector (excluding federal organisations and crown corporations) organisations that are active in culture, education or other fields relevant to this call.

The application process for this fund has two stages: an Expression of Interest stage, and a Full Application stage.  The deadline for submitting Expressions of Interest is Tuesday, October 11, 2005.  A Full Application may only be submitted upon the request of Canadian Culture Online after review of all Expressions of Interest.

http://chroniclejournal.com/story.shtml?id=28460

Chiefs press funding lawsuit

By Staff - The Chronicle-Journal

August 13, 2005

Sioux Lookout-area chiefs will move ahead on a day-care funding suit against the Chiefs of Ontario and the federal government.

The chiefs’ “political group” had put the civil court action on hold for 30 days to allow newly elected Ontario Regional Chief Angus Toulouse time to put together a new funding package for remote First Nation day-care centres.

However, officials said Toulouse’s report to the Sioux Lookout Area Aboriginal Management Board’s (SLAAMB) annual meeting in Sioux Lookout this week “did not adequately address the (chiefs’) concerns and issues.”

Sachigo Lake First Nation Chief Alvin Beardy said in a news release that “our infrastructure does not meet the demands of our people or communities.”

“Our First Nations are severely under funded in all areas,” he said.

Big Trout Lake First Nation Chief Donny Morris explained earlier that “the decision to cut the SLAAMB funding from $538,928 to $300,006 came with no consultation, and after assurances from representatives of Human Resources Canada and the Chiefs of Ontario that its funding for the 2004-05 fiscal year would remain the same as the previous year.”

In a lawsuit filed in December, SLAAMB is seeking $250,000 in operating money and up to $23 million in capital funding for additional day-care facilities from Human Resources and the Chiefs of Ontario.

The day-care funding issue arose during negotiations between Sioux Lookout-area First Nations and Ottawa over financial support for employment and training services in 25 communities in Northwestern Ontario. While an agreement was reached in April, the chiefs said more talks were needed “to clear up a few outstanding issues.”

They include funding to meet program and service costs in remote communities; child care facilities; and the ongoing development of a government-to-government working relationship.

The Department of Indian Affairs and Northern Development (DIAND) has initiated an education policy and program review which includes a review of the Post Secondary Education (PSE) Program . Click here to view the material distributed for this review process (Word document).

The objective of the review for the PSE program is to develop a renewed policy and accountability framework for the Post-Secondary Education program. To this purpose, a joint Working Group has been established to undertake the review. The Working Group is composed of representatives from the Assembly of First Nations, the National Association of Indigenous Institutes of Higher Learning, the Labrador Inuit and Indian and Northern Affairs Canada. In the course of the review the Working Group will examine a number of issues such as goals and objectives of the program, roles and responsibilities, the types of transitional preparatory programming are beneficial for student success at PSE, program funding and program management.  The Working Group has agreed to undertake some of the work with the support of consultants.

We are inviting you to submit  proposals for the review of the Goals & Objective of the program and/or the transitional / preparatory programming pieces. Your proposals should include information on your credentials and how you meet the requirements to carry out the work. Please provide relevant work done in the area for which you are submitting the proposal. Your proposals should also identify tasks, time assigned for each task as well as the costs associated with each task. The contractor is expected to deliver a written report that addresses all of the issues identified in the attached description of work for each of the two separate contracts. Only the successful candidate will be contacted. If the contract is awarded the GST number and/or your social insurance number will be required. Attached here for your reference are the research principles to guide the contractors work as well as a bibliography of relevant material.

If you are interested in being considered, please forward us your proposal by 5PM (eastern time) on Friday, August 30, 2005. Please e-mail your proposal to

Margaret Mitchell at jedburgh@primus.ca
Tiziana Carafa at carafat@ainc-inac.gc.ca

We look forward to receiving your proposals.

Marie Saint-Pierre Larose, INAC co-chair
Dawn Maracle, AFN Co-chair