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Curriculum Grants

Arts students working and writing on books, using laptops, with phones and headphones on the table.

In the Faculty of Arts we are committed to building more equitable, diverse, and inclusive communities through our teaching, research, and service. As part of our ongoing commitment to achieve equity, through listening to students’ voices, and identifying and filling gaps in existing Arts curricula, we have established three new curriculum redevelopment grants. These grants will support the redesign of existing courses and/or the development of new courses aimed at addressing systemic barriers and gaps in curriculum.

Our objective is to support curricular initiatives that promote equity, inclusion, accessibility and community engagement, which are vital to the Faculty of Arts.

New to Arts, and building on our priorities and commitments in the Faculty of Arts, the Curriculum Redevelopment Grants are intended to support the redesign of existing courses (curricular enhancement) or the development of new, critical, engaging curriculum aimed at addressing structural barriers and major gaps in program content. These grants are intended to support curricular development that addresses  any one or a combination of the following themes:

Addressing the general absence of Indigenous content in Arts’ programming and curriculum, this grant aims to support faculty who wish to redesign existing courses or create a new course(s) that speaks to Indigenous history, knowledge, theory and methods, land-based education, law and governance, language, literature or arts. In particular, we invite applications from faculty who are integrating material that challenges settler colonial frameworks. Proposals will be considered for introductory-level courses through to upper-level undergraduate and graduate courses. Ideally, there should be some indication about how specific course proposals align with Indigenous-focused courses elsewhere in the applicant’s home department and/or within the Faculty widely.

To help address anti-Black racism and the absence of Black content in existing Arts’ curriculum, this grant aims to support faculty who are creating new courses or redesigning existing courses in a way that centres Black histories, Black philosophical thought, theory, methods, politics, literature or arts, in particular, but not exclusively, from a Canadian perspective. We also invite applications from faculty who are integrating material that addresses and challenges anti-Black racism. Proposals for this funding will be considered for introductory-level courses through to upper-level undergraduate and graduate courses. Applicants should indicate ways in which a proposed new course either introduces a new area of focus or builds on an existing course(s).

This grant is intended to support curricular initiatives that promote equity, inclusion, and accessibility by various means, including the development of new courses, enhancement of existing courses, introduction of new methods of course delivery and/or forms of assessment. Building and maintaining equitable, inclusive and universally accessible and socially relevant curricula are vital to the Faculty of Arts. Our goal in introducing this grant is to embed sustainable, mutual learning and equitable, inclusive curriculum development. Proposals may include but are not limited to, activities such as the creation of new courses for BA programmes, identification of content gaps related to issues of inclusion (for example, LGBTQ+ content; disabilities content; content on intersectionality); course revision from syllabus to  delivery to D2L/online components, with specific attention to principles of “universal design for learning” (opens in new window) ; development of a fully accessible online guide (a “living document”); development of  a course based in local community engagement.

Grant Details:

  • Grant Cycle: Grants will be administered in the 2021 and 2022 academic years
  • Number of Grants: Up to 10 grants per academic year, for a total of up to 20 
  • Funding Amount: Up to $3,000 per grant 
  • Application timeframe: October 1 to October 31 and March 1 to March 31 (2021 and 2022)
  • Deadline: October 31 and March 31

Notification to Successful Applicants: Via email, approx. 30 days after the close of the competition

Duration: Projects are typically expected to be completed and the grant spent within 12 months of receiving funding.  Unused funds must be reported and returned.  

Final Report: Successful recipients are required to submit a brief report to the Dean of Arts no later than 6 months upon the completion of the project. The report should include outcomes (e.g. course syllabi for new or revised course) and any assessment or evaluation of proposed curricular change(s). We encourage successful recipients to share a summary of their projects with their departments.

Application Instructions: Your submission will require the following information:

  • Name, position, departmental affiliation for principal applicant 
  • Name, position, departmental affiliation of all co-applicants
  • Name, position, organization name, etc. of community partner(s), if applicable
  • Project title
  • Project description - nature of proposed activities (max 500 words)
  • Brief outline of  proposed teaching objectives & outcomes (max 300 words)
  • Rationale for how this course fits into, builds upon, complements, fills gaps in existing curriculum (max 300 words)
  • Proposed plan for assessing/ evaluating proposed objectives and outcomes (max 300 words)
  • Brief description of engagement with students and communities (max 300 words)
  • Desired outcomes and impacts within Toronto Metropolitan University and in community (max 300 words)
  • Confirmation from Department Chair or departmental Curriculum Committee (email) 
  • Detailed timeline (bullet points)
  • Proposed project budget and justification (bullet points)
  • Letters of support (if involving other individuals or units at Toronto Metropolitan University or external partners)

Applications will open on October 1st. Please use your Toronto Metropolitan University ID to access the Google Form. Late or incomplete proposals will not be considered. 

For more information, please contact: Associate Dean (US), Faculty of Arts: Kathleen Kellett, kkellett@torontomu.ca

  1. Individual Faculty of Arts tenure-stream faculty or a team led by Faculty of Arts tenure-stream faculty. Teams led by Arts tenure-stream faculty may include LTF, contract lecturers, staff, students or other community members; however, please consult the CUPE Collective Agreement for payment for curriculum development.  
  2. Proposals can be a collaboration with external/community partner(s). 
  3. Proposals involving multiple partners must identify a specific faculty member as a lead and include a letter of endorsement/support from the community partner. If you hold or intend to apply for additional sources of funding for this project, please include this in your proposal.
  4. Please note: If involving a community and/or taking an intersectional approach, demonstrating established consultation and collaboration with representatives from the group(s) or community involved must be part of the submission of the proposal. 
  5. For community experiential learning proposals, please provide evidence of community partner(s) involvement in defining the need and the project concept; evidence that the project will benefit both the community partner and student learning; and evidence that students will have opportunities to apply learning from the classroom to the community experience and learning from community experience to the classroom. 

Eligible expenses include but are not limited to:

  • Honoraria to community partners or CELT initiatives (e.g. outings, events)
  • Research Assistant to support searches, archival research, literature review, etc. For proposals that pertain to Indigenous Education or Critical Black Scholarship, please consider hiring Black-identified and Indigenous students (preference will be given to supporting Faculty of Arts students, but others may be considered). 
  • If applicable, incentives (eg $10 Toronto Metropolitan University BookStore gift card) for student participation in focus group or other data collection for student input.
  • Purchase of relevant supplemental reading materials, resources, site licenses, etc. 
  • ASL services
  • Please note that any new course proposals that are funded are subject to Departmental, Liberal Studies and any other Toronto Metropolitan University -wide approvals. 
  • Success in these competitions should NOT be treated as a form of Faculty-level approval for curriculum change. 
  • While not to be used as official approval to run a new course, all proposals need confirmation (email) from their Dept. Chair, Chair designate, or Curriculum Committee to proceed with their grant submission. 

The aim of these grants is to support and enhance Departments’ existing initiatives to achieve their equity objectives when it comes to addressing anti-Black and anti-Indigenous racism and other forms of discrimination, absences, and gaps.

  1. Clear rationale for course (re)design: 10% 
    1. Rationale should be described in relation to curriculum gaps, department vision (e.g. PPR), student demand and outreach, and links to related courses in the home department of faculty member(s).  
  2. Clear and feasible description of the proposed new or revised direction or content: 30%
    1. Briefly touch upon proposed course description, objectives, learning outcomes, list of possible resources, preliminary thoughts on assignment structure. 
    2. Clear explanation of the proposed experiential and community-engaged (CELT) initiatives, if applicable
  3. Nature and quality of the involvement and learning experience of student(s) and/or nature and community organization(s)/member(s): 30%
  4. Appropriateness of budget and rationale:  20%
    1. Clear and detailed breakdown of what funds are needed and how funds will be used.
  5. Clarity of the proposed plan for evaluation of outcomes, ensuring identification of clear tangible and concrete actions and outcomes: 10%
  • 4-5 member committee (with at least one student representative where possible)
  • Serve a one-year term, renewable once
  • Representation from Dean’s Advisors on Blackness and Black Diasporic Education and Indigenous Education, or their designates
  • Cross-Faculty, interdisciplinary representation with balance of SS & H (rotating annually to ensure representation of all departments over the 2 year period)
  • Past winners may be invited to adjudicate
  • Applicants are exempt from sitting on the adjudicating committee in the year in which they apply
  • On-line review process; with one final meeting, if required

Toronto Metropolitan University has a unique tripartite curriculum at the undergraduate level. It has three different categories of courses: Professional (Core), Professionally-related (Open elective) and Liberal Studies courses that are listed on a range of tables in the academic calendar from which students select their courses.

Please note: Faculty who are designing new courses should be aware of the timelines and permissions in order to have their course appear in the calendar for the following year.  

  1. To start, have a look at your department’s curriculum to determine where in the tripartite curriculum your course would best fit (e.g. liberal studies or professional course, as required or elective). We suggest discussing this with your department curriculum committee. Proposing a liberal studies course is sometimes easier as the course has no prerequisites and possibly a higher enrollment, as the course is open to all university students (but this may not allow you to build course depth due to the diversity of students’ professional backgrounds). All Liberal Studies courses have a mandatory essay component. Adding a professional course may require discussion on where the course would fit in your program curriculum, and whether it would be required or an elective course. 
  2. Approval Process - New course development typically requires a series of approvals beginning at the departmental level. Once approved by your Departmental Council, Professional and Professionally-related courses can be submitted for inclusion in the academic calendar. This may involve collaborating with other programs in the Faculty of Arts or elsewhere to have the course appear as part of other programs’ curriculum as well. Your Program Assistant and Undergraduate Program Assistant will help with this step.
  1. Step one and two in "Proposing New Courses" above are important.
  2. Liberal Studies courses, both lower level (Table A) and upper level (Table B), must be approved not only by your Departmental Council, but also by the Liberal Studies committee, which accepts proposals in May of each year. Before new courses are submitted annually for inclusion in the subsequent Toronto Metropolitan University academic calendar, they require approval by the Dean’s office and all affected departments and units by October, and formally approved as an information item by Senate, generally by November of each year.
  1. If you are redesigning a course and are keeping the course description intact: this will not require formal approval but could nevertheless be discussed in your curriculum committee.
  2. If you are revising a course and wish to revise the course calendar description: this needs to be approved by your Department Council; then your PA/UPD will help with the submission of appropriate forms. 

This grant is intended to support proposals with strong experiential, community-engaged learning and teaching components. Experiential learning includes a variety of activities in which students learn through their direct engagement with a community, workplace or international experience. These can take the form of lab work, thesis/senior project courses, capstone courses, simulations, problem-based learning, case studies, field courses, service learning, career-integrated learning. The grant is designed to provide faculty members with resources to enable them to undertake, develop, evaluate and report on forms of experiential learning in their undergraduate and/or graduate courses.  

Grant Details:

  • Grant Cycle: Grant will be administered in the 2021 and 2022 academic years
  • Number of Grants: Up to 2 grants per funding period (4 per academic year) 
  • Funding Amount: Up to $3,000 per grant 
  • Application timeframe: October 1 to October 31 and March 1 to March 31 (2021 and 2022)
  • Deadline: October 31 and March 31

Notification to Successful Applicants: Via email, approx. 30 days after the close of the competition

Duration: Projects are typically expected to be completed and the grant spent within 12 months of receiving funding.  Unused funds must be reported and returned. 

Final Report: Successful recipients are required to submit a brief report to the Dean of Arts no later than 6 months upon the completion of the project. The report should include outcomes (e.g. course syllabi for new or revised course) and any assessment or evaluation of proposed curricular change(s). We encourage successful recipients to share a summary of their projects with their departments.

Application Instructions: Your submission will require the following information:

  • Name, position, departmental affiliation for principal applicant 
  • Name, position, departmental affiliation of all co-applicants
  • Name, position, organization name, etc. of community partner(s), if applicable
  • Project title
  • Project description - nature of proposed activities (max 500 words)
  • Brief outline of  proposed teaching objectives & outcomes (max 300 words)
  • Rationale for how this course fits into, builds upon, complements, fills gaps in existing curriculum (max 300 words)
  • Proposed plan for assessing/ evaluating proposed objectives and outcomes (max 300 words)
  • Brief description of engagement with students and communities (max 300 words)
  • Desired outcomes and impacts within Toronto Metropolitan University and in community (max 300 words)
  • Confirmation from Department Chair or departmental Curriculum Committee (email) 
  • Detailed timeline (bullet points)
  • Proposed project budget and justification (bullet points)
  • Letters of support (if involving other individuals or units at Toronto Metropolitan University or external partners)

Applications will open on October 1st. Please use your Toronto Metropolitan University ID to access the Google Form. Late or incomplete proposals will not be considered.

For more information, please contact: Associate Dean (US), Faculty of Arts: Kathleen Kellett, kkellett@torontomu.ca and/or Reena Tandon, reena.tandon@torontomu.ca.

  1. Individual Faculty of Arts tenure-stream faculty or a team led by Faculty of Arts tenure-stream faculty. Teams led by Arts tenure-stream faculty may include LTF, contract lecturers, staff, students or other community members; however, please consult the CUPE Collective Agreement for payment for curriculum development.  
  2. Proposals can be a collaboration with external/community partner(s). 
  3. Proposals involving multiple partners must identify a specific faculty member as a lead and include a letter of endorsement/support from the community partner. If you hold or intend to apply for additional sources of funding for this project, please include this in your proposal.
  4. Please note: If involving a community and/or taking an intersectional approach, demonstrating established consultation and collaboration with representatives from the group(s) or community involved must be part of the submission of the proposal. 
  5. For community experiential learning proposals, please provide evidence of community partner(s) involvement in defining the need and the project concept; evidence that the project will benefit both the community partner and student learning; and evidence that students will have opportunities to apply learning from the classroom to the community experience and learning from community experience to the classroom.

Eligible expenses include but are not limited to:

  • Honoraria to community partners or CELT initiatives (e.g. outings, events)
  • Research Assistant to support searches, archival research, literature review, etc. For proposals that pertain to Indigenous Education or Critical Black Scholarship, please consider hiring Black-identified and Indigenous students (preference will be given to supporting Faculty of Arts students, but others will be considered). 
  • If applicable, incentives (eg $10 Toronto Metropolitan University BookStore gift card) for student participation in focus group or other data collection for student input.
  • Purchase of relevant supplemental reading materials, resources, site licenses, etc. 
  • ASL services
  • Please note that any new course proposals that are funded are subject to Departmental, Liberal Studies and any other Toronto Metropolitan University -wide approvals. 
  • Success in these competitions should NOT be treated as a form of Faculty-level approval for curriculum change. 
  • While not to be used as official approval to run a new course, all proposals need confirmation (email) from their Dept Chair, Chair designate or Curriculum Committee to proceed with their grant submission.

The aim of these funds is to support and enhance Departments’ existing initiatives to achieve their equity objectives when it comes to addressing anti-Black and anti-Indigenous racism and other forms of discrimination, absences, and gaps.

  1. Clear rationale for course (re)design: 10% 
    1. Rationale should be described in relation to curriculum gaps, department vision (e.g. PPR), student demand and outreach, and links to related courses in the home department of faculty member(s).  
  2. Clear and feasible description of the proposed new or revised direction or content: 30%
    1. Briefly touch upon proposed course description, objectives, learning outcomes, list of possible resources, preliminary thoughts on assignment structure. 
    2. Clear explanation of the proposed experiential and community-engaged (CELT) initiatives, if applicable
  3. Nature and quality of the involvement and learning experience of student(s) and/or nature and community organization(s)/member(s): 30%
  4. Appropriateness of budget and rationale:  20%
    1. Clear and detailed breakdown of what funds are needed and how funds will be used.
  5. Clarity of the proposed plan for evaluation of outcomes, ensuring identification of clear tangible and concrete actions and outcomes: 10%
  • 4-5 member committee (with at least one student representative where possible)
  • Serve a one-year term, renewable once
  • Cross-faculty representation with balance of SS & H (rotating annually to ensure representation of all departments over the 2 year period).
  • Past winners will be invited to adjudicate
  • Applicants are exempt from sitting on the adjudicating committee in the year in which they apply
  • On-line review process; with one final meeting, if required

Toronto Metropolitan University has a unique tripartite curriculum at the undergraduate level. It has three different categories of courses: Professional (Core), Professionally-related (Open elective) and Liberal Studies courses that are listed on a range of tables in the academic calendar from which students select their courses.

Please note: Faculty who are designing new courses should be aware of the timelines and permissions in order to have their course appear in the calendar for the following year. 

  1. To start, have a look at your department’s curriculum to determine where in the tripartite curriculum your course would best fit (e.g. liberal studies or professional course, as required or elective). We suggest discussing this with your department curriculum committee. Proposing a liberal studies course is sometimes easier as the course has no prerequisites and possibly a higher enrollment, as the course is open to all university students (but this may not allow you to build course depth due to the diversity of students’ professional backgrounds). All Liberal Studies courses have a mandatory essay component. Adding a professional course may require discussion on where the course would fit in your program curriculum, and whether it would be required or an elective course. 
  2. Approval Process - New course development typically requires a series of approvals beginning at the departmental level. Once approved by your Departmental Council, Professional and Professionally-related courses can be submitted for inclusion in the academic calendar. This may involve collaborating with other programs in the Faculty of Arts or elsewhere to have the course appear as part of other programs’ curriculum as well. Your Program Assistant and Undergraduate Program Assistant will help with this step.
  1. Step one and two above are important.
  2. Liberal Studies courses, both lower level (Table A) and upper level (Table B), must be approved not only by your Departmental Council, but also by the Liberal Studies committee, which accepts proposals in May of each year. Before new courses are submitted annually for inclusion in the subsequent Toronto Metropolitan University academic calendar, they require approval by the Dean’s office and all affected departments and units by October, and formally approved as an information item by Senate, generally by November of each year.
  1. If you are redesigning a course and are keeping the course description intact: this will not require formal approval but could nevertheless be discussed in your curriculum committee.
  2. If you are revising a course and wish to revise the course calendar description: this needs to be approved by your Department Council; then your PA/UPD will help with the submission of appropriate forms.