National Lottery Community Fund: Forces in Mind

Overview

Each year approximately 16,000 people leave the UK Armed Forces and for the vast majority they transition successfully into the civilian world, their lives having been enormously enriched by their time in service. However, some need additional support, and it is these most vulnerable people that Forces in Mind Trust exists to help.

What do they fund?

• Evidence generation that supports policy and service delivery for Service personnel and families during their transition from the military to civilian life.
• Collaborative projects that support long-term positive change for the Armed Forces community during their transition to military life.
• Projects that leverage existing evidence to implement recommendations and make positive change.

How they fund - programme areas

They fund across seven programme areas – Employment, Health, Housing, Criminal Justice, Relationships, Finance and our Enabling Programme.  

• Housing
  • All veterans and their families are able to access good quality, affordable, secure and sustainable accommodation solutions.
• Employment
  • All ex-Service personnel and their spouses achieve successful employment outcomes.
• Health
  • All Veterans and their families enjoy a state of positive physical and mental health and wellbeing, enabling them to contribute to and benefit from wider society.
• Finance
  • All ex-Service personnel and their families achieve an appropriately sustainable and stable financial state according to their circumstances and needs.
• Criminal Justice System
  • Ex-Service personnel and their families avoid adverse contact with the Criminal Justice System, with effective support being available if needed.
• Relationships
  • All ex-Service personnel can access effective support to enjoy positive inter-personal relationships in family, professional and social environments.
• Enabler
  • The enablement of measures to promote and support coordinated initiatives benefiting the wider ex-Service community.

Priority Outcome Areas

They are currently focused on six key priority areas for funding:

• Understanding:
  • The unique impact of Service life on families
  • The changing nature and needs of the Armed Forces community
• Supporting improvement that:
  • Empowers the system and individual
  • Increases collaboration
  • Improves awareness of Armed Forces in mainstream services
  • Take account of the unique conditions and impact on health and wellbeing

They welcome applications that support these priority outcomes under their Housing, Employment, Health, Finance, Criminal Justice, Relationships and Enabler programmes.

They work collaboratively with their grantees to maximise the impact of projects.

They also commission work, for which they publish Requests for Expressions of Interest (REOI) publicly.

Eligibility

They accept applications that are relevant to their change model and meet their eligibility.

They welcome applications from various organizations from small not-for-profit groups and charities to larger institutions such as universities. 

For overhead costs within project budgets, they have a policy on this which they encourage applicants to read before preparing their submission. It can be found here.

They strongly advise applicants to read the eligibility criteria provided and only proceed if your application falls within the objectives of the Trust.

Eligible projects

• A project where the proposed outcomes meet an identified need and help achieve FiMT’s Change Model.
• A project with a clear need which is relevant to FiMT’s Change Model.
• A project with strong potential to grow or to provide opportunities for replication.
• A project which can bring about sustainable change.

They support work with impact across the UK. This includes projects working in any of England, Scotland, Wales or Northern Ireland, or across multiple countries of the UK.

Are they the right funder for you?

To achieve their outcomes around the above areas, they fund projects that align to their four Change Mechanisms:

1. Knowledge and evidence - Understanding the scale and nature of the issue, evidence of what works best, and what does not work.
2. Influencing and Convening - Influencing policy makers and service deliverers and convening experts.
3. Collaboration and Leadership - Promoting collaboration and leadership in the sector, including in policy making and service delivery.
4. Capacity Building - Enabling organisations to transform in order to achieve greater impact.

Using their Change Model, based on a Theory of Change to help them to realize their vision and conduct their mission, they consider transition around six Outcomes that outline the end goals and fully appreciate their interconnectedness. These Outcomes form the basis of their programme of funding:

What makes a strong application?

Preparing funding applications is time-consuming, so they’ve put together some tips to help you write your grant application.

• Have well defined objectives.  What does long term success look like? How will you know you have achieved it?  How will these help achieve FiMT’s Change Model?
• Provide clear rationale for your project.  Do you have evidence to support your approach? What are the potential pitfalls and your contingency plans? Is the timescale realistic?
• Ensure that the costs requested for your project are necessary and that the figures add up.
• Write in clear English and avoid technical jargon where possible.
• Give yourself plenty of time.  It’s really important that you avoid rushing your application.

The Research-Snapshot, produced by the FiMT Research Centre, is a plain language guide to research terms; it might be a useful resource for preparing applications.