Project Overview
Disability Rights UK are in the process of creating an online support hub for Disabled People’s Organisations (DPOs) and Small Micro-Community Organisations (SMCOs). Through delivering previous online training sessions and our own Together Fund evaluation we have found that DPOs and SMCOs struggle to attend training sessions and workshops because of the constantly competing priorities. The Cost of Living (CoL) crisis and its negative impact on Disabled people across all areas of life including physical activity extends pre-existing inequalities and compounds the issues faced by DPOs and SMCOs. We believe that providing small pots of funding for internal training or impact work direct to DPOs and SMCOs will not create the resilience we need to enable sustainable disability rights projects during these challenging times. Ultimately, the hub's purpose is to provide resources on the below five topics to support organisations with their core business functions.
- Inclusion and intersectionality (Submissions closed)
- Evaluation and monitoring (Submissions closed)
- Governance
- Locating income and bid writing (Submissions closed)
- Recruitment and retainment of staff and volunteers (Submissions closed)
The need for this piece of work
Initially, we planned to co-produce resources on the above topics with DPOs, some of which we have funded via Sport England’s Together Fund that Disability Rights UK is a delivery partner for. However, this is proving very difficult, which we suspect is down to DPO’s capacity. Therefore, we would like to contract several consultants that have experience of working in the DPO sector and preferably identify as Disabled to produce initial first drafts of resources. We would like each consultant to produce a resource for 1 – 2 of the above topics, and then engage with DPOs to feed into the resource drafts. The consultant should choose the topic(s) that they have the most experience/expertise in.
Format of the resources
Resources can either be in a text or video format or a combination of both, we would like to be guided by the consultant on this. Ideally, we would like to keep the front-facing resources as short as possible as from experience we have found that DPOs don’t have the time to read through lengthy documents or watch lengthy videos. Text resources will be displayed on the website in a similar format to this.
Text format: no more than 1000 words per front facing resource briefing/guide/blog, supplemented by downloadable documents (e.g. templates, further reading, links to further reading etc) with no word limit.
Video format: no more than 5mins in length per resource
We would like the consultant to engage with specific DPOs that have already expressed an interest in working with us on specific topics - please specify which topic(s) you have expertise in and will be applying for:
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(Submissions closed) Inclusion & Intersectionality. Produce a guide on how organisations can be more intersectional. Deaf Ethnic Women’s Association, Asian People’s Disability Alliance, and Alliance for Inclusive Education need to be contacted for their input.
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(Submissions closed) Evaluation & monitoring. For evaluation and monitoring we would like the consultant to produce a simplified version of Sport England’s evaluation framework tailored to DPOs in the form of a single document/webpage that will sit on the hub. Living Options Devon need to be contacted to provide feedback on the resource draft because they have won awards for their evaluation.
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Governance. How should we adapt the resource we already have on the DR UK’s Get Yourself Active website, which we wish to move to the hub on DR UK’s main site. Disability Positive to be contacted because they are a big organisation with a lot of experience. We would like the consultant to create a more accessible version and link it to the full guidance from the charity commission.
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(Submissions closed) Locating income. Sport England have a page on how to generate income. We would like to produce a resource similar to this but tailored to DPOs in the form of a single document/webpage that will sit on the hub. Disability Peterborough should be contacted because they have their own income generation strategy.
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(Submissions closed) Recruitment and retainment of staff and volunteers. A guide to be produced on the recruitment and retainment of staff and volunteers. Living Options Devon & Disability Positive to be contacted as they are both large DPOs with a lot of experience in this area.
We may also receive interest from other DPOs wanting to contribute to the Support Hub, they should also be integrated to this work; we will coordinate communication.
Expected time and pay: Five days work per topic @ £450 per day
Start date: Immediately
Deadline: Resources to be complete by end of August 2023
Applications:
- Register interest with a CV of your history and examples of prior consultancy work and specify your desired topic(s) to both rebecca.tayler-edwards@disabilityrightsuk.org and elliot.watson@disabilityrightsuk.org, with the subject header ‘DPO Support Hub Consultant Bid’.
- Desirable: provide written examples of your work and a pitch for the section.
- Interest registration will be followed up with a screening interview (virtual) on the same week.
Required characteristics:
- History working in a DPO
- Personal lived experience of disability
- Solid understanding of the value of Disabled led groups and their unique needs.
- Understanding of and application of the Social Model of Disability