Funding: Children in Need main grants

It has a Main Grants programme open to bids from charities and not-for-profit organisations for grants of more than £10,000 a year for three years. It also runs a Small Grants programme for funding below £10,000 for one year.

What do Main Grants fund?

The Children in Need Main Grants programme will fund organisations supporting children and young people aged 18 and under and experiencing disadvantage through:

• Illness, distress, abuse or neglect
• Any kind of disability
• Behavioural or psychological difficulties
• Living in poverty or deprivation.

The programme supports organisations that work directly with children and young people and those that aim to improve their social and physical environment. It also funds projects that prevent disadvantage and support children experiencing such problems.

Who can apply?

The grants are only open to not-for-profit organisations that work with disadvantaged children and young people of 18 years and under who live in the UK, the Isle of Man or the Channel Islands.

In the final 12 months of an organisation's funding, an application for further funding for the same project, or for a different one, can be made. Children in Need guidance says that "convincing evidence" of the difference the grant has made to the lives of the disadvantaged children and young people is required for further funding bids to be successful.

Those funded through the Small Grants programme can also apply for a Main Grant as long as it is for work with a different group of children and young people.

How much can be applied for?

The programme supplies grants of more than £10,000 a year. Although there is no upper limit, the guidance warns that grants of more than £120,000 over three years are rarely made.

Requests for larger amounts of funding are very competitive.

What is not funded?

There are a number of restrictions on how grants can be used. In addition to only funding UK-based work, applications will not be successful for:

• Work that statutory bodies have a duty to fund
• Work done by local government or NHS bodies
• Building projects applying for more than £20,000
• Projects that promote religion
• Trips or projects abroad
• Medical treatment or research
• Pregnancy testing or advice, information or counselling on pregnancy choices
• Awareness-raising work, except where it is targeted at children or young people most at risk
• Bursaries, sponsored places, fees or equivalent
• Bids from individuals
• General appeals or endowment funds
• Help with budget shortfalls or debt repayments
• Retrospective funding
• Organisations that have applied in the last 12 months
• Projects unable to start within 12 months of the grant award date
• Unspecified expenditure
• Organisational overheads or costs that the organisation would incur whether the project was running or not.

How to apply?

The programme has a two-stage application process. Initial applications should be submitted online along with supporting additional information. This includes an "eligibility quiz" that applicants must complete and provide evidence for the answers given. Children in Need says the most common reason applications are unsuccessful is because not all the required extra information is included.

There are useful "planning your project" and "A to Z guidance" documents online to support applicants.

Successful initial applicants will be invited to submit full applications within three weeks of being notified. Telephone assessments will take place the following month, with applications considered by regional committees. Children in Need's board of trustees will make final decisions, with applicants informed of the outcome via email.

When to apply?

The next two deadlines for initial applications are:

23.59, 13 September (final decision due mid February 2018)

23.59, 16 January 2018 (final decision due mid June 2018)

Funding roundup

Children's charities Empire Fighting Chance and YMCA North Tynside and community interest company Legacy School Sport, are to receive a share of nearly £500,000 from the New Philanthropy Capital-led Impact Management Programme. The funding will be distributed between 11 charities and social enterprises to help them grow and gather evidence of impact. A further 30 grants will be distributed from January 2018.http://accessimpact.org

A project to educate under-12s about the human rights of children and young people has been awarded £247,000 from the Big Lottery Fund. Little Voices Being Heard is a project run by the Wales Observatory on Human Rights of Children and Young People, based at Swansea and Bangor Universities. The project sees children identify issues, carry out research and call for change based on their findings. www.biglotteryfund.org.uk

UK Youth has received a grant for £100,000 from the Nominet Trust, the trust arm of Nominet, the official registry of UK domain names. Through its new Digital Reach initiative the trust is working with 12 delivery partners to fund six pilot projects in the UK, testing a range of new models to meaningfully improve the digital skills, confidence and resilience of those young people on the wrong side of the "digital divide".www.nominettrust.org.uk

The Department for Education has awarded 24 projects a share of £30m through it's Children's Social Care Innovation Fund. Among those to be awarded funding under the £200m programme include Credo Care, Derby Council, The Adolescent and Children's Trust and Barnardo's.

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