Supporting Care Leavers
Grant details
| Grant size: | Approximately £10,000 to £75,000 |
Who is it for?Local groups based in Somerset that meet our minimum standards.
What is it for?To support the health and wellbeing of care leavers, including unaccompanied asylum-seeking children, through sports-based activities.
What can we use this money for?
This Fund aims to support initiatives that use sports and physical activities to improve the health and wellbeing of care leavers, including unaccompanied asylum-seeking children, aged 16 to 25. We’re looking for projects that can provide targeted services to help these young people:
- improve their physical health through regular exercise and sports
- enhance their emotional wellbeing, addressing issues like trauma, emotional resilience, and social relationships
- develop social skills and build positive relationships with peers and positive adult role models
- promote integration and community involvement, especially for unaccompanied asylum-seeking children.
If you can do that, then you can use this grant over 12-24 months for:
- project costs, like staff time or travel
- small capital costs, like pieces of equipment
- core costs, like rent, utilities, and insurance.
This funding is specifically for targeted services and not for general community sports activities.
Which groups can apply?
We can only consider your group for a grant from this Fund if you meet our minimum standards.
Our minimum standards cover things like:
- the types of groups we can give a grant to and how we expect them to be run
- how we expect those groups to manage their finances
- how those groups keep people safe.
All of our minimum standards are on our FAQs page, where you can also find lots of information about applying for funding.
You can also use our eligibility checker which will help you understand if you can apply for a grant from us.
When do we have to apply?
Expressions of interest must be submitted by 5pm on Wednesday 26 March 2025. Decisions will be made in April 2025.
How likely am I to get shortlisted?
We have around £200,000 to award and expect to receive more expressions than we can fund. Based on our other funding programmes, we’re usually able to support 2 out of every 3 applications we receive.
We’re more likely to give you some money if your group:
- is based in Somerset
- runs on less than £500,000 a year
- can demonstrate a track record of working with care leavers or other groups of young people
- has provided reliable reporting on any previous grants we’ve given you.
How are decisions made?
Your expression will be assessed by one of our team. They’ll read through what you’ve written and check places like the Charity Commission and your website. We may contact you if we have any questions.
A recommendation will then be made, and a panel will make the final decision. The panel for this programme will include representatives from Somerset Council.
Where does this money come from?
This funding is one of our first commitments from The Somerset Youth Fund. This is a Collective Giving Fund that brings together local people passionate about supporting young people in Somerset. You can read more about the Fund’s priorities in this report.
In this case, the programme is supported by CCLA and Somerset Council, alongside local trusts, businesses (Mulberry) and individual donors.
As well as supporting health and wellbeing, we’re also funding transport provisions for care leavers and offer a university bursary programme.
How do I apply to this programme?
You can apply if your group:
- wants to provide targeted sports-based activities to improve the health and wellbeing of care leavers, including unaccompanied asylum-seeking children
- meets our minimum standards.
We’re initially seeking short expressions of interest. This requires you to provide some basic details about your group and then some brief descriptions of what you are interested in doing, and an indication of what you think it might cost.
We’ll shortlist the expressions we’re interested in taking forward and arrange a time to speak with you in April.
Get help with this fund
This Fund is managed by Andy, our Programmes Director. Andy can help if you:
- aren’t sure if you meet our standards.
- aren’t sure if this is the best fund to apply for.
- can’t use our online form.
- can’t attach the documents we’ve asked for.
Grant details
| Grant size: | Approximately £10,000 to £75,000 |
Who is it for?Local groups based in Somerset that meet our minimum standards.
What is it for?To support the health and wellbeing of care leavers, including unaccompanied asylum-seeking children, through sports-based activities.
FAQs
You can find our minimum standards and everything else you need to know about applying on our FAQs page.
