Evaluator

Disability Arts Online (DAO) is looking for an Evaluator to support its landmark heritage project, Cripping Culture: a Journey into Disability Arts Heritage. There is a maximum budget of £4,000, inclusive of VAT, to deliver all aspects of the project set out in the brief.

This is a freelance commission for an experienced evaluator to provide an external perspective to help us understand the value and impact of the Cripping Culture project. This will involve engagement with the project team, steering group, key stakeholders and the community to draw insights from the project processes and outputs.

Cripping Culture: A Journey into Disability Arts Heritage is delivered by DAO with key industry partners and funding from the National Lottery Heritage Fund with the aim to share the story of the Disability Arts movement and preserve our shared heritage for future generations.

As an Arts Council England National Portfolio Organisation and Paul Hamlyn Foundation funded organisation DAO has well established evaluation practices for assessing the impact of our core work and learning how to improve what we do. We want to build on these through working with an external evaluator to cast an impartial, constructive and critical eye over this project as we embark on our first major heritage project.

Overview

Application deadline: 12 noon Monday 2 March 2026

Contract Conditions: Self-employed Contract

Remuneration: £4,000 (total budget)

Region: UK

Work location: Remote

Deliverables

• In liaison with the project team (including comms team), design and conduct surveys using the Impact and Insight toolkit at appropriate points in the project.
• Gather insights from the project team, steering group, and key stakeholders at the beginning and periodically throughout.
• Produce evaluation reports at the end of each of the three project phases.
• Contribute to project team learning sessions by presenting findings and facilitating discussions that lead to improvements throughout the project.

Evaluation Requirements

• The evaluation should be conducted ethically, respecting participants’ privacy and confidentiality and adhering to relevant ethical guidelines.
• The evaluation format needs to be accessible to the people participating.
• The evaluation must be undertaken in consultation with the project steering group volunteers and in close collaboration with the project team.

Required skills, expertise and approach

• Experience in evaluating heritage projects
• Knowledge and experience of a range of evaluation techniques
• Excellent communicator
• An understanding of the issues disabled people face
• Experienced at producing accessible and engaging reports
• Alignment with our organisational values of Connection, Empathy, Curiosity, Responsiveness, and Social Justice.

How To Apply

Before applying for the role, please review the PDF Evaluator Brief to obtain the project details.

If you require the brief in a format that is not already provided, please let us know by emailing heritage@disabilityarts.online

To apply for this position, email heritage@disabilityarts.online and include the following:

• CV/Professional profile
• Letter / audio / video expression of interest (Max 2 pages of A4 or 5 minutes video / audio). This should outline your evaluation expertise, especially with regards to experience in designing, conducting, and delivering evaluations for arts and heritage organisations or similar community-based initiatives. Please also give an account of your evaluation methodology

• A quote for the work that sets out:
  • Your proposed hourly/daily rate for the work (including VAT if applicable)

• The number of hours/days you expect the project to require overall

• A breakdown showing how your time is allocated across the deliverables

The quote may be submitted in any format (e.g. Word document, PDF, or spreadsheet). The quote should relate only to your fee for the work and should not include additional costs such as subscriptions, software, or other expenses.

Contracting

This work will be delivered under a contract for services. The rate provided in your application will be incorporated into the contract as a fixed rate.

Your working hours are flexible and organised by you; however, you are responsible for completing the project within the hours quoted.

You must be based in the UK.

Most of the work will be undertaken remotely, though occasional in-person meetings may be required.

The evaluator must be available to start from April 2026.

Deliverables should be completed by March 2028.