Independent Evaluator

Culture in Common (CiC) is looking to commission an independent evaluator to lead on the evaluation of the New Forest’s Creative People and Places (CPP) programme from September 2026 to April 2029. This is a freelance, part-time role with a fixed fee of £30,000 (inclusive of travel expenses and VAT). In their submission, applicants should provide a budget breakdown and indicate the estimated number of working days required to deliver the evaluation.

We are looking for an experienced evaluator to revise and implement the evaluation framework for Culture in Common and support the delivery team in assessing and sharing the impact and learning from the programme. The evaluator will be positioned not only as someone who reports on impact, but as a learning partner supporting the ongoing development of Culture in Common. The successful candidate or organisation will interact with community champions/organisations of the New Forest, the delivery team and the consortium.

As an Arts Council England (ACE) funded CPP project, Culture in Common is committed to achieving the following outcomes:
– Engage more people from eligible places in a wide range of arts and cultural experiences as audiences and/or participants
– Empower communities to lead and shape local cultural provision
– To ensure excellence and relevance in both the engagement process and the creative and cultural experiences on offer
– To encourage partnerships between publicly funded, amateur, voluntary, community and commercial sectors, as well as collaboration across various cultural institutions
– To take an Action Research approach to community engagement in arts, creativity, and culture; learn what works best and share that learning

As an action-research programme, learning should form a central strand of the evaluation. We want the evaluation to help us understand what is changing, why it is changing, and how we adapt our approach during the programme, rather than only assess successes and challenges.