Funding Opportunities

£50,000 – £250,000. Deadline noon 2 October 2020

£250,000 – £5million. Deadline for Expressions of Interest noon 24 September 2020

A short-term competitive fund to kick-start environmental renewal whilst creating and retaining a range of jobs in England. It is open to environmental charities and their partners.

The Green Recovery Challenge Fund is accepting applications for two grant levels:

£50,000 – £250,000. Deadline noon 2 October 2020

£250,000 – £5million. Deadline for Expressions of Interest noon 24 September 2020

Projects must be ready to deliver and you must be able to spend the funding by 31 March 2022.

The Fund covers three themes:

• Nature conservation and restoration, including ecosystem restoration and species recovery;
• Nature-based solutions, particularly for climate change mitigation and adaptation; and
• Connecting people with nature.

All projects will need to deliver against at least one of these themes, but may contribute to more than one or all of the above.

For more information go to the Lottery Heritage Fund

The Trust will consider applications from charities registered in England & Wales, Scotland or Northern Ireland in the fields of Education & Young People, Communities, Environment & Conservation, Health, Arts & Culture, International Development, Heritage, and Supporting the Armed Forces

The Schroder Charity Trust generally makes grants of up to £5,000. In 2019/20 the average grant was £4,368. They receive between 400-500 applications each year and approximately 100 charities receive grants, meaning there is a 1 in 5 success rate (i.e. of every 5 applications received, 1 will receive funding). They fund both core costs and specific projects, but not large capital appeals. Grants are usually for a one-year period, rather than over multiple years.

The Schroder Charity Trust will not support:

• Individuals
• Animal Welfare Organisations
• Political Organisations
• Major Capital Appeals
• Social Enterprises or CICs (unless they are also a registered charity) 

For more information go to the Trust’s website

The KFC Foundation provides grants to support grass roots organisations in the heart of our restaurant’s communities. Organisations empowering young people in the UK to fulfil their potential by providing safe social spaces, mentoring or work and social skills.

They want to fund work that helps young people to create firm foundations, by addressing their needs through early intervention.

This grant programme is for registered charities, registered community interest companies, unincorporated clubs or associations or unregistered charities with a turnover of less than £300,000. We will make grants of between £200- £2,000.

The KFC Foundation welcomes funding applications from organisations which:

• Benefit young people aged 11-25 years old.
• Supports those in a position of social disadvantage (i.e. care leavers, those experiencing homelessness, young carers, young parents, young people at risk of or with experience of the criminal justice system).
• Empower young people to fulfil their potential and build a positive future by providing spaces that allow young people to feel safe and secure, helping them to unlock talent, build life skills, provide mentoring and improve their chances to gain meaningful employment.
• Are local to a KFC restaurant
• Will demonstrate positive results from their project within 12 months of funding being received

For more information go to the KFC website

Deadline 30th September

Grants for voluntary and community organisations and charities to help with the cost of holidays or respite breaks for disabled children (aged 3 to 17 years) with physical, mental, or emotional impairments.

Applications are accepted from individual families and on behalf of groups of children, registered charities and other organisations.

Charities and other organisations must provide a copy of their latest audited accounts in addition to other information.

There must be evidence of a disability from a medical or social services professional.

The holiday must be taken by the day preceding the child’s 18th birthday.

For more information go to the Trust website

Deadline 30^th October

Voluntary, community and social enterprise (VCSE) organisations can apply for funding to run projects focused on starting well in life, in particular, in order to develop schemes for babies from deprived areas or BAME backgrounds

The Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC), NHS England and Improvement, and Public Health England (PHE) are inviting applications from voluntary, community and social enterprise (VCSE) organisations to join the VCSE health and wellbeing fund Starting Well.

Projects must:

• have run for at least 3 years
• develop or expand services for children from preconception to 2-and-a-half years old, so they receive the best possible start in life
• be focused on improving health outcomes in black, Asian and minority ethnic (BAME) communities or areas of high deprivation (including urban, rural and coastal areas)

The deadline for applications is midday on Friday 30 October 2020.

For more information go to the Government website

Deadline 15th November

The Getting Schools Back on Track grant has been designed to help ease the pressures that have been placed on all families during the pandemic. Getting children back to school in September is a priority not only for learning needs but to also enable parents to go back to work.

For many families whilst returning to school is a huge positive it will potentially create extra costs at a time when they are struggling to afford the basics, never mind any extra’s. Asda Foundation is committed to supporting those families who need help

For more information go to the Foundation’s website

Charitable, not-for-profit and commercial organisations operating within England’s arts, museums and heritage sectors can apply for a loan from noon on 21 August.

The £270 million Culture Recovery Fund – Repayable Finance Programme aims to support cultural organisations which were financially sustainable before COVID-19 but are now at imminent risk of failure and have exhausted all other options for increasing their resilience.

The loans are part of the Government’s £1.57 billion Culture Recovery Fund and will be administered by Arts Council England.

Loans start at £3 million. There is no upper limit. The loan terms include a payment term of up to 20 years, an initial repayment holiday of up to four years and a 2% interest rate per annum.

The money can be used to help prepare for re-opening and re-starting work or to remain cost-efficient in the short-term in order to reopen at a later date if, for example, reopening under social distancing is not permissible or does not represent a value for money approach. Proportionate redundancy pay outs are eligible, where decisions have been made to reduce staff.

Cultural organisations in England that are properly constituted with a governing document may apply. Eligible organisations include charitable, not-for-profit and commercial enterprises operating within the arts, museums and heritage sectors, including independent cinemas, comedy clubs and nightclubs.

The investments made through the programme are intended to ensure that organisations can return to sustainable operations no later than 31 March 2022.

Applications will be accepted from 12 noon on 21 August 2020 to 12 noon on 9 September 2020.

You can find more information here

Historic England is offering grants of between £1 million and £10 million to support repair and restoration works at nationally important heritage attractions which have been impacted by the coronavirus/COVID-19 pandemic.

Historic England will be delivering the £50 million Heritage Stimulus Fund to restart vital construction and maintenance on heritage sites to preserve visitor attractions and provide immediate work for some of the most vulnerable heritage specialists and contractors in the sector.

The £34 million Grants for Programmes of Major Works is part of the £50 million Heritage Stimulus Fund which forms part of the Government’s £1.57 billion Culture Recovery Fund, a support package to protect the country’s cultural, arts and heritage organisations.

The funding is to be used for a project or programme of projects comprised of capital repair works, or discrete phases of capital works, that can be completed by 31 March 2021.

You can find more information here

From Civil Society

A fund of £4.95m to help charities scale up their digital capabilities has opened for applications.

Funds are provided by the National Lottery Community Fund (NLCF) and distributed in partnership with the Centre for the Acceleration of Social Technology (CAST), supported by the Catalyst Network. Charities that are part of a network of at least ten charities can apply for a combination of grant funding and support worth up to £60,000.

Some £1.75m will be given away in grants, while the remaining £3.2m will fund expert support.

The programme is organised into two parts: a four-week Discovery phase, to help charities understand and research the problem they are trying to address, and a ten-week Development phase, to develop a digital solution.

Charities can either get funding for both parts or just one – for example, they can get funding directly for the Development phase if they can demonstrate they have already been through a “discovery” phase.

They will need to commit to sharing their learnings with their network, which can be formal, such as for a federated charity, but also informal as long as applicants can prove its existence.

Charities will also need to be working with groups that have been disproportionately impacted by the pandemic. This includes older people, people pushed into crisis, people in medical or end of life care, people who experience health inequalities, loneliness and social isolation or poor mental health, children and young people, disabled people and families hit hardest. NLCF and CAST also said they are “particularly interested” in applications from user-led organisations or representing marginalised communities.

Organisations can apply via the Catalyst site until 7 September for the Discovery phase and until 20 September for the Development phase.

To read the full article go to Civil Society