Evaluation of the Multiculturalism Program

Management response

Recommendations Response Action Accountability Completion date
1. Given that the Multiculturalism Program has broadened CIC’s mandate (to include longer-term integration) and its clientele (to include all Canadians), CIC should ensure that multiculturalism is fully integrated into CIC policies and programming.

CIC agrees with this recommendation. Part of this work has already been completed—the integration of Multiculturalism Program into the departmental PAA. Further work is currently underway, to better integrate Multiculturalism Program objectives into other CIC policies and programs including, as part of the department’s modernization initiative, to harmonize grants and contributions programs across the department’s mandate, mission and vision.

These are positive steps toward better integration of the Program into the Department.

  • Establish an internal CIC working group to review mechanisms, programs, and services in place that can promote the “multiculturalism message”, and further expand their reach to the Canadian population as a whole.
Citizenship and Multiculturalism Branch September 2012
  • Under the Modernizing the Workforce initiative, develop and implement generic work descriptions for officers across all of the department’s Gs&Cs programs.
Integration Program Management Branch September 2012
  • Leverage Settlement and Citizenship policies and programs in order to advance multiculturalism objectives.
Citizenship and Multiculturalism Branch Winter 2012
2. With the relatively small amount of funding available for CIC’s Multiculturalism Program, the objectives and expected outcomes of the program need to be better aligned with available resources and strategically focused on core priorities and needs. The department needs to assess how best it can do this.

CIC agrees with this recommendation recognizing that the broad scope of the Multiculturalism Program objectives, approved in 2009, derive directly from the extensive scope of the Multiculturalism Act itself.

However, the department recognizes that more can be done to bring better focus to various program activities during implementation, such as a having a more targeted and focused Call for Proposals, continuing to advance priorities taking an issue-based approach to work with the Federal/Provincial/ Territorial network of multiculturalism officers (FPTORMI) and the federal Multi-Champs Network (MCN), and developing better performance indicators of what constitutes an “integrated society” from a multiculturalism perspective.

To facilitate the exchange of information among federal institutions, CIC is now piloting the Multiculturalism Gateway, an on-line forum for MCN members. This will help to address some of the issues related to managing a large network and to house information, thus enabling the network to more easily access information provided by CIC.

Over the past two years, progress has been made to reduce the administrative burden by streamlining components of the Annual Report process (shorter submission templates, reduced distribution), MCN (Multi Gateway) and FPTORMI (forward agendas).

  • Currently, the Multiculturalism Program is undergoing a review to determine how best to move the program forward. Part of this review will address the breadth of Program objectives. Depending on the outcome of the review and Ministerial direction, this could result in a more focused approach to program implementation.
Citizenship and Multiculturalism Branch Spring 2012
  • A strategy will be developed, post-multiculturalism review, to better leverage existing mechanisms (FPTORMI, MCN) in order to focus the Program on specific issues. This strategy will also take into account that public institutions, along with the MCN, are looking to CIC to provide tools for advancing multiculturalism, such as best practices guides.
Citizenship and Multiculturalism Branch Fall 2012
  • In addition, priorities for future Multiculturalism Calls for Proposals will be more targeted than in 2010.
Integration Program Management Branch Fall 2012
  • The department will consider review options to further improve the quality and focus of the Multi Annual Report and reduce its length to be more in-line with other CIC reports to Parliament, while keeping in mind that federal institutions want visibility for their work on multiculturalism.
Citizenship and Multiculturalism Branch Fall 2012
3. Further efforts are required to improve the transparency and timeliness of the approval process for projects and events

CIC agrees with this recommendation. Funding lapses in the past were largely due to delays in project approvals. These lapses have decreased over the past 3 years and it is anticipated that they will continue to decrease once a more harmonized approach to Gs&Cs funding across CIC is put into place.

We note that decision-making authority for this program has not been delegated from the Minister to the department.

  • Work has already begun to implement a more harmonized approach to Gs&Cs funding and management across the department (settlement, resettlement and multiculturalism), including use of common tools, and development of integrated manuals and guides and processes.
Integration Program Management Branch Fall 2012
  • Work is also underway to modernize the department’s funding protocols in an effort to reduce delays, improve transparency, and reduce burden on recipients. This work will include a review of delegation instruments and support the response to recommendation 2 with respect to priorities under a CFP process.
Integration Program Management Branch Fall 2012
4. The governance for the Multiculturalism Program needs to be improved to support better communication and coordinated decision-making among the responsible branches and units for the program.

CIC agrees with this recommendation. Initial governance issues arose when the Program moved to CIC from PCH—resulting in a decentralization of functions to better fit within CIC’s model.

Currently, governance of the program is implemented principally through two Branches—Citizenship and Multiculturalism (in the Policy Sector) and Integration Program Management (in the Operations Sector).

  • Governance for the Multicultulralism Program will be strengthened through current oversight mechanisms and new mechanisms to improve information sharing and to better support coordinated decision making as follows:
  • a Senior Management Policy Forum (with respect to policy development),
  • on the Operations side: an ADM-led DG level Business Operations Committee;
  • a Director-level Settlement, Resettlement and Multiculturalism Management Committee;
  • a new DG-level steering committee, which includes all policy DGs with an interest in Grants and Contributions, was established in Q3 of 2011/2012; and
  • frequent meetings with the Public Education and Promotion unit in Communications.
Citizenship and Multiculturalism, Integration Program Management, and Communications Branches  
5. Given the issues identified with respect to performance measurement, the program needs to implement a robust performance measurement strategy. This will require:        
a) a review of, and possible revisions to, the performance measurement strategy framework developed during the planning phase for this evaluation CIC agrees with this recommendation. A program measurement strategy was developed and is in place, in accordance with departmental requirements. However, a review of this framework and the indicators is needed in order to ensure that they address program outcomes. Review program performance measurement framework to ensure it has appropriate performance indicators and data collection tools to measure progress against expected results Citizenship and Multiculturalism Branch Fall 2012
b) improvements to the present data collection system; The central database for the Multi program (GCIMS) was migrated over from PCH late in 2010 and there were some difficulties in bringing over all elements of the performance measurement data. Therefore, more needs to be done to ensure that our data collection systems are able to collect meaningful performance information. As part of Gs&Cs modernization initiative, a business process study is currently underway and a business case for improvements to information management systems (including options for capturing performance data) is in development. Integration Program Management Branch Winter 2012
c) a review of the current requirement for funding recipients to submit a project evaluation report, so that they can be used to compile consistent and comparable data on CIC’s program outcomes.   CIC will undertake a review of the current evaluation process to ensure the capture of consistent and comparable data on CIC program outcomes. Integration Program Management and Citizenship and Multiculturalism Branches Winter 2012
d) implementation of a process for ensuring that the project and event feedback forms remain up-to-date, and are regularly compiled and analyzed to assist with the assessment of project and event outcomes. New data collection tools were developed to help gather performance information (e.g., participant feedback forms for both projects and events). These forms will need to be captured and rolled-up into a format that allows for easy performance reporting.

A database to accurately capture and roll-up performance-related information from the project and event feedback forms will be developed.

Annual reviews of these tools will be undertaken to ensure that they are still relevant, address key objectives and that information is up-to-date.

Integration Program Management and Citizenship and Multiculturalism Branches Winter 2012

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