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Grant guidance for applicants

In various guises, The Chester Bluecoat Charity has been working to help the people of Chester and a defined surrounding area for over 800 years. Society has changed immeasurably during that time and the Charity has changed to meet new challenges and to continue to help the most disadvantaged in our society. We have helped many organisations in projects to support social cohesion, education and community development.

The Trustees have recently reviewed our grant making process and criteria to reflect the needs of today. We want to encourage the organisations to whom we make grants to think big, to be really focused on making a positive step in reducing the causes of poverty, disadvantage and inequality.

Funding objectives criteria

We make grants to organisations which aim to structurally change the reasons for poverty, disadvantage and inequality of opportunity, to raise and support aspirations in our areas of benefit.

As well as demonstrating how they meet the Charity’s funding objectives, applicants for Strategic Funding must meet the following criteria:

  1. Demonstrate sustainability - the funding we give can support sustainability, but the organisation must have a sustainable model and organisation, and have community and stakeholder support.
  2. Organisations must pass due diligence criteria on finances and personnel. This includes having suitable governance and as a minimum a bank account in the name of the organisation applying. We do not award grants to individuals or commercial organisations.
  3. Projects/Organisations should be funded for specific measurable qualitative or quantitative outcomes (by outcomes we mean what will be the positive change achieved) – this does not preclude funding core costs, but still needs to be planned and reported.
  4. Organisations must have their head offices inside our area of benefit and a turnover of less than £300k.
  5. Funding requests should not be for the supply of services or goods that the state should normally and legally support.
  6. Member-based organisations (i.e. where people pay subscriptions) must show benefit to the wider community not just members.

What Next?

Application
After submitting your application to the charity, you will receive acknowledgement of it within one working week.

Decision outcome You will be notified on our final decision within one month of application submission.

Grant Award Document Trustees require the successful applicants to sign a grant award document prior to funds being released. This document lays out what the grant is being made for (as detailed in your application) and the expectations of the Trustees during the grant period.

Questions?

If you have any queries please contact office@thechesterbluecoatcharity.co.uk or 01244 345787 in the first instance.

If necessary, we can arrange further conversations to help you make the application.

All applications should be made directly (rather than via Trustees) to office@thechesterbluecoatcharity.co.uk or by post to:

The Bluecoat, Upper Northgate Street, Chester, CH1 4EE