School-Based Nursery Capital Grant
Information for eligible schools about the School-Based Nursery Capital Grant 2024 to 2025.
Applies to England
Applications for the School-Based Nursery Capital Grant 2024 to 2025 and the registration of interest closed at midday on 19 December 2024.
The School-Based Nursery Capital Grant is for eligible state-funded primary-phase schools to bid for up to £150,000 of funding of capital funding.
The funding can only be used for capital expenditure to repurpose spare space within the school building to create or expand nursery provision.
This is the first stage in a long-term commitment to expand school-based nurseries across England.
For more information, refer to and Establishing school-based nursery provision, which explains the requirements and recommendations for expanding or opening new school-based nursery provision.
Contacting you about the outcome of your application
We will email all applicants in spring 2025 with the outcome of their application.
If your application is successful, we will:
- issue a grant funding agreement to sign before any funds can be released
- provide more details about payment processes, reporting requirements, and timelines before you sign the agreement
The grant funding agreement is legally binding and outlines:
- your roles and responsibilities
- the terms and conditions you must follow to receive funding
Online application service
Applicants can sign into the online application service to:
- check their application status
- download a copy of their application and any supporting documents
Supporting documentation that was submitted by email will be available to download in January 2025.
Use the same sign-in details you used to submit your application.
Registration of interest
The registration of interest has now closed. The information submitted will help inform the development of the programme.
If you registered your interest, you may be contacted by us to discuss support options. If we contact your school, it won’t affect the outcome of any future grant applications.
Contact us
To submit a query about school-based nurseries, use the customer help portal.
Updates to this page
Published 17 October 2024Last updated 19 December 2024 + show all updates
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Applications for the School-Based Nursery Capital Grant 2024 to 2025 and the registration of interest closed at midday on 19 December 2024. Applicants will be notified of the outcome in spring 2025.
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Updated to clarify that Pupil Referral Units are excluded from applying for the grant, that supporting documentation larger than 1MB cannot be uploaded to the Online Application Service and must instead be compressed or emailed to [email protected], and that maintained nursery schools unable to access the Online Application Service can request to be placed on the registration of interest for future school-based nurseries by submitting their details through the Customer Help Portal. A link to webinar which took place on 28 November was also added. Also updated the ‘School-Based Nursery Capital Grant 2024 to 2025 guidance’ to clarify how the department will allocate funding in the case of a tie breaker which results in more successful applications than funding available, to clarify the role of local authorities, to state that applicants who are not awarded the SBN grant can chose to continue with their significant change application, without needing to submit a new one, and that bid coordinator must use the schools DfE sign-in account to apply via the Online Application Service.
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Added links to webinar recordings. Also updated the ‘School-Based Nursery Capital Grant 2024 to 2025 guidance’ to clarify the following: that the grant cannot be used for new builds on spare land, or extension projects which do not also use existing spare space in the school building, that successful applicants will need to cover overspends from their own sources of funding and cannot use the grant to reimburse expenditure incurred before the grant is awarded, that academies can apply for the grant even if they have already applied for a significant change and that schools who are unable to complete a consultation before the deadline should contact the Customer Help Portal. We have also updated the guidance to: inform applicants who want to work in partnership with a PVI or childminder that any pricing agreed with an enterprise must not be more favourable than the expected market rate, inform applicants that successful schools will receive the capital funding through their usual channels and unsuccessful schools will automatically be placed on the registration of interest.
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First published.