Here we have listed some terms and definitions that you may see as you navigate our database and the Canadian granting ecosystem. These definitions have been sourced from the Canada Council for the Arts , the Manitoba Arts Council, and Imagine Canada’s Grant Connect . If you can’t find the term you’re looking for on this list try the above organizations. 

Arts Council: A government or private non-profit organization dedicated to promoting the arts; mainly by funding local artists, awarding prizes, and organizing arts events. They often operate at arms-length from the government to prevent political interference in their decisions.

Emergency Funding: A one-time grant to cover immediate short-term funding needs on an urgent basis.

Emerging/New Career Artist: This refers to an artist who is in the early stages of their career. An artist is typically considered emerging or new career if they have between 1 to 5 years of professional activity.  

Equipment Funds: Funds to purchase equipment, furnishings, or other materials.

Established Artist: This refers to an artist who is “mid career” which is generally considered to be 5 + years of professional activity. 

Foundation: Foundations are a type of charitable organization that primarily exist to distribute funds. Canadian foundations may give grants (donations) to other charities, they may exist to be a funding arm for another charity – such as hospital foundations – or they may carry on their own charitable activities. Foundations in Canada are categorized as either public or private. These types generally differ by their funding sources and governance structure.

Operational Funding: A grant awarded to an arts organization to help pay ongoing costs of maintaining the activities, programming, governance, and administration of the organization.

Peer Assessment Committee: A group of individuals with expertise in diverse parts of the arts sector, including disciplinary knowledge and other expertise (such as administration). Such committees review and assess applications as part of the granting process.

Priority Community: Priority Communities (often called Equity Seeking Groups) are communities that face significant collective challenges as a result of systemic marginalization and oppression. By identifying priority communities funding bodies work to remove the historic, social, economic and environmental barriers to equal access that are based on age, ethnicity, disability, economic status, gender, nationality, race, sexual orientation and transgender status, etc.  

Project Funding: Project Grants normally have one payment and that are for a single project or for a project that repeats over a given period.

Professional Development: A grant awarded to increase knowledge or skill through study, travel, research, workshops, apprenticeships, residencies, etc.

Seed / Start-up Funding: A grant used to start a new project or organization. Seed grants may cover salaries and other operating expenses of a new project.