Armed Forces Covenant Fund Trust : Armed Forces Families Fund: Early Years programme
Overview
Eligibility
They invite applications from:
- Early childhood education and childcare providers operating where Armed Forces families live or work and must offer group-based childcare and have at least 50% of Service children on roll (unless under a cluster, see below).
- Local authorities who wish to supply specific training to early childhood education and childcare providers supporting Service children aged 0-5 years.
- An appropriately constituted organisation which provides training for setting staff to support Service children.
If your setting has less than 50% Service children on roll, you could still apply as a cluster. This means submitting a group bid on behalf of two or more setting with smaller numbers of Service children. If you choose to apply via this route, you can apply for:
- Staff training with an Armed Forces focus.
- Funding for a shared resource, such as a roving Armed Forces Early Years Support Worker.
There is more detailed information about eligibility in the programme guidelines available on the website. It is important that you read the programme guidance carefully before you apply.
What’s available
You can apply for a grant of between £5,000 and £80,000. They expect this programme to be competitive and that they will be unable to support all the applications they receive.
Themes and priorities
They are looking for projects that can deliver sustainable change. This means that they want to know what evidence you have to support the approach that you seek to take, and crucially, how people from armed forces communities have helped to shape this.
Your project must clearly benefit armed forces families with a child under 5 by enhancing their access to high quality childcare.
This year (2025/26), they are focusing on four outcomes. Your project will need to contribute towards at least one of these outcomes:
- Increased capacity at the setting to allow more service children to attend.
- Better learning environments for service children.
- Have provided appropriate training and development to staff to support service children.
- Establishing collaborative networks and shared resources through clusters to address the needs of service children