Department For Education
Overview
The Department for Education (DfE) allocates funding each year to help maintain and improve the condition of school buildings and grounds.
For financial year 2024 to 2025, eligible schools can access funding through either:
- school condition allocations (SCA), with funds paid to eligible bodies responsible for maintaining school buildings
- the condition improvement fund (CIF), a bidding round with funds paid directly to single academy trusts, small multi-academy trusts (MATs), small voluntary aided (VA) bodies and sixth-form colleges
In addition, devolved formula capital (DFC) is allocated for individual schools and other eligible institutions to spend on capital projects.
Who the funding is for
School condition funding includes capital allocations for:
- local authorities and local-authority-maintained schools, including maintained nursery schools
- local voluntary-aided bodies and voluntary-aided schools
- academies and large multi-academy trusts (MATs)
- sixth-form colleges
- non-maintained special schools
- special post-16 institutions with eligible students
Eligibility for SCA for the 2024 to 2025 financial year
Schools are either part of bodies eligible forSCAor are eligible forCIFdepending on their size and type.
Local authorities, larger MATs and larger VA school bodies receive direct SCA to invest in priorities across the schools for which they are responsible. Schools in smaller academy trusts, smaller VA bodies and sixth-form colleges are instead able to bid into the Condition Improvement Fund (CIF).
CIF eligible schools were invited to bid into the fund for 2024 to 2025. If a school was invited to bid for CIF in the 2024 to 2025 financial year, their responsible body will not receive any SCA funding on their behalf. Schools invited to CIF were instead able to bid for support through that route, if they had condition investment requirements.
To receive direct SCA, multi-academy trusts and VA bodies must have met both eligibility criteria:
- the trust or VA body must have had 5 or more open schools at the start of September 2023
- those open schools (or their predecessor schools) must have had at least 3,000 pupils counted in the spring 2023 census or the 2022 to 2023 individualised learner record (ILR)
For special and alternative-provision schools (including pupil referral units), we multiply the pupil count by 4.5 for the purposes of SCA eligibility for the 2024 to 2025 financial year. For example, we would count a MAT with 1,000 pupils in special schools as having 4,500 pupils. This reflects the fact that these schools tend to have lower pupil numbers for their size and more complex facilities.
For eligibility, we count all pupils that are sole, dual-main, or dual-subsidiary enrolled. If pupils are registered at more than one institution, we divide the count by the number of institutions that the pupil is registered at. For example, pupils dual registered at a mainstream school and a pupil referral unit (PRU) would have their count divided by 2 at both institutions.
For nursery schools and sixth forms, we use the number of full-time equivalent (FTE) pupils rather than headcount.
We notify academy trusts andVAschool bodies that are eligible forSCAeach autumn. Eligibility should not be assumed unless it has been confirmed.
All of these institution types are eligible for devolved formula capital.
Funding allocations for the 2024 to 2025 financial year
Capital funding is based on financial years. For the final funding amounts for the financial year 2024 to 2025 see:
Eligibility forSCAfor the 2025 to 2026 financial year
Eligibility for School Condition Allocations (SCA) and the Condition Improvement Fund (CIF) for financial year 2025 to 2026 will be determined in the same way as previous years.
To receive direct SCA, multi-academy trusts and VA bodies must have met both eligibility criteria:
- the trust orVAbody must have had 5 or more open schools at the start of September 2024
- those open schools (or their predecessor schools) must have had at least 3,000 pupils counted in the spring 2024 census or the 2023 to 2024 individualised learner record (ILR)
Both these criteria must be met in order to be eligible for SCA, otherwise the schools in that academy trust or voluntary aided group will be eligible to bid for CIF.
Further information on the methodology used to calculate SCA for 2025 to 2026 will be available in spring 2025. The value of future allocations should not be assumed until confirmed.
How the funding is calculated and what it can be spent on
The condition funding methodology and spend guidance sets out information on eligibility and how the funding is calculated. It also provides guidance on the purpose of the funding, what it can be spent on and over what time period.
See for information on eligibility and how the funding was calculated for 2024 to 2025.
Previous years funding
See theNational Archives websiteforSCAandDFCallocations for previous years.
In 2022 to 2023, eligible schools and sixth-form colleges received an allocation from an additional 447 million of capital funding to improve energy efficiency. This was part of an additional 500 million of capital funding for schools and further education institutions in England.
This funding was for institutions that were eligible for devolved formula capital in 2022 to 2023.
See: