Fulfilling Lives: A Better Start

Our new £165m Fulfilling Lives: A Better Start initiative aims to deliver a step change in preventative approaches in pregnancy and the first three years of life to improve life chances of babies and young children.

The key features of the programme are.

• We invest £30-£50 million in 3-5 areas, each with a population of approximately 50,000 for 8 to 10 years.
• Each area runs a variety of programmes and initiatives to improve outcomes for children in three key areas of development: social and emotional development; communication and language development; and nutrition.
• There will be a ‘systems change’ in the way that local health, public services and the voluntary sector work together to put prevention in early life at the heart of service delivery and practice.

We will make awards for 8 to 10 years for specific geographic areas. 

Each area should have a total population of between 30,000 and 70,000 people, and be an area where a range of health, education and social indicators provide evidence of deprivation and high levels of need amongst children. The selected area can be made up of adjacent wards or may comprise two or more separate clusters of wards.

In May 2013 40 areas have been longlisted to submit a stage one application form.

• Download the list of the areas

From this we will produce a shortlist of around 10-15 areas by Summer 2013.

These shortlisted areas will be invited to submit a stage two application and offered development grants and support to help them prepare their final proposal.  Final applications will be submitted by a lead voluntary and community sector (VCS) organisation in each of the shortlisted areas, with 3-5 awards announced by March 2014.

VCS organisations that are interested in getting involved should contact their local lead VCS organisation. 

Those of you that attended the recent before you apply events we held in London and Leeds will know that we have appointed the Social Research Unit at Dartington to support the 10 -15 shortlisted areas to build and refine their strategies for stage 2.
 
Dartington have a wealth of excellent advice and information that will be useful in helping you think about any additional development support you may want to apply for at stage 1, as well as giving you a full understanding of the depth of support that will be available for those that make the shortlist at stage 2.

• Download the information on Social Research Unit  package

The theory of change animation from the Centre for the Developing Child shows the importance of building adult capabilities to improve child outcomes: