Emergency school improvement fund (non-capital)
Funding to support schools facing unexpected or imminent failure to improve in areas such as leadership, governance, safeguarding, human resources and finance.
Purpose
The emergency school improvement fund (ESIF) is available to:
- primary schools
- secondary schools
- middle schools
- all-through schools
- alternative provision and special academies
- local-authority-maintained schools
- pupil referral units
It is intended to address:
- unexpected or imminent failure
- unexpected withdrawal of planned or existing support addressing failure or imminent failure
- failure where other long-term support options are not feasible
Eligible schools can receive school improvement support from a multi-academy trust (MAT). The MAT must have support from a local authority or regional director.
MATs can apply to provide short-term support while a longer-term sustainable solution is developed, for example through the support of a new academy sponsor.
MATs can also apply to provide longer-term whole school support where no other sustainable solution can be found to address the school failure.
Eligibility
MATs can make an application to support a school. MATs cannot apply for a school within their trust.
Schools eligible for ESIF:
- Local authority-maintained schools that are rated inadequate by Ofsted, or not making necessary improvements, where there is strong evidence that immediate support is necessary
- Academies that are rated inadequate by Ofsted, or not making necessary improvements, where there is strong evidence that immediate support is necessary
- Non-maintained special schools that are rated inadequate by Ofsted, and have committed to the academy conversion process, where there is strong evidence that immediate support is necessary before conversion
- maintained schools or academies which were previously outstanding but now require improvement, where there is strong evidence that immediate support is necessary
- maintained schools and academies not in receipt of support, where strong local intelligence shows the school is in imminent danger of being judged inadequate by Ofsted if school improvement is not put in place quickly
Apply
A MAT must make an application to support an eligible school.
Applications must have the support of either the relevant regional director or local authority before they are submitted to DfE.
MATs can email emergency.fund@education.gov.uk to request an application form and submit approved applications.
In some cases, a regional director may identify eligible schools that need ESIF support.
Funding
We will issue a grant offer letter to successful applicants confirming the details of their proposal, funding allocation and terms and conditions.
We will only make funding payments to a verified trust bank account.
ESIF is subject to standard DfE grant funding agreement: terms and conditions but we may include additional conditions to the funding offer letter for successful applicants.
Reporting and accountability
The applicant will need to complete termly monitoring reports for the duration of the support and grant assurance at the end.
Updates to this page
Last updated 23 February 2023 + show all updates
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We no longer accept bids led by national leaders of education, so we have removed references to them. In the ‘Eligibility’ section, we have added references to schools which are not making necessary improvements.
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Updated as teaching schools and national support schools no longer exist. Moved existing eligibility criteria on to this guidance. Added information about the application process, funding allocations and reporting and accountability.
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First published.