Empower’em’s mission is to empower women of colour (WOC) through a curated journey of personal and professional growth, leading to enhanced leadership capabilities and independence in decision making. The Our Way Forward mentorship program is designed to support that mission by connecting WOC who are interested in personal and/or professional growth. The program matches a mentee to a mentor with lived experience in the mentee’s area of interest to facilitate sharing and learning through advice, guidance and teachings that empower the mentee with the knowledge and resources they seek to pursue their goals.

By the end of the program, participants can expect to have received effective and impactful guidance and advice in their area of interest for growth, as well as membership to the Empower’em community and the opportunity to develop interpersonal relationships with other community members.

Anyone who self-identifies as a woman of colour over the age of 18.

No, we are accepting applications from anywhere in Canada.

Yes, you can apply to the program to be matched as either a mentee or a mentor, but you are required to fill out both applications in order to be considered for either position.

Applications for mentors and mentees open on August 8, 2022 and close on September 4, 2022. Selected applicants will be contacted for interviews up until September 25, 2022. Final selections and matches will be disclosed by the week of October 10, 2022. The program will begin on October 20, 2022 and will run for 24 weeks until April 1, 2023.

The program will be mainly virtual. Interviews and Community Meetups will be hosted by Empower’em using Zoom (at Eastern Standard Time). One-on-one sessions scheduled between mentor and mentee may use any virtual application that is accessible to them. Depending on health care regulations and participant choice, we may facilitate some of our social nights in-person this year.

The Community Meetups, workshops, and one-on-one sessions will require approx. 30-35 hours of virtual meeting time over 24 weeks. Both mentees and mentors should expect to invest a few additional hours planning and/or preparing for meetings as well as reflecting and implementing the action plan as required.

Because safe spaces can be different for different people, we cannot always guarantee a safe space. However, we strive to create safer spaces for individuals by vetting all candidates, hosting regular check-ins, and ensuring that the Empower’em Community Guidelines on safety and privacy are understood and observed by all participants.

Mentees will help select their potential mentor match. After receiving applications, a roster of mentor profiles will be created and made available to mentees. Mentees will then select their top 5 mentors, based on shared lived experiences and desired outcomes from the mentorship program. The Empower’em team will then try their best to finalize the pairings based on the mentee’s top 5 choices. Despite our efforts, we cannot guarantee that a mentee will be paired with their top mentor choice.

The following criteria will be used to review mentee applications:

• Completeness of application and answers
• Clear, detailed explanation of goal(s) you hope to work towards
• Clear, detailed description of what you are looking for in a mentor
• Unique identities/experiences that would enhance the diversity of our community
• MOST IMPORTANTLY, we are looking for individuals who are committed and excited to be a part of this program

The following criteria will be used to review mentor applications:

• Completeness of application and answers
• Clear, detailed explanation of tangible areas you can help a mentee with
• Demonstration of skills or understanding of what makes a good mentor
• Unique identities/experiences that would enhance the diversity of our community
• MOST IMPORTANTLY, we are looking for individuals who are committed and excited to be a part of this program

This year the number of participants has been reduced from 30 to 24, with a total of 12 mentee-mentor pairs

Our priority is to facilitate meaningful conversations and pairings between mentees and mentors who can offer valuable and relevant guidance. This means that we may not always be able to find you a good match. In the case that you are not matched in this round, we will invite you to participate in our next iteration of the program.

Matches are made based on the mutual interest and lived experience of mentees and potential mentors. We will match participants based on our judgments of a pair’s ability to benefit from their relationship with each other. We would encourage all participants to engage in the process even if they do not believe they are well-matched, but to alert the team of any issues or conflicts of interest that may interfere with their ability to engage meaningfully with the program. We will discuss these issues on a case by case basis.

You can email us at info@empowerem.ca and we will do our best to provide a version of the application in your required format.

Yes, currently our program is only offered in English, however, if a mentor/mentee pair share another language, they are welcome to communicate with each other in their preferred language.

Currently, there is no cost to the program, as we believe that personal and professional growth should be accessible to all women of colour.