The Department for Education has published information on the post-16 budget grant for the period April to August 2025.
Previously this grant was known as the post-16 schools’ grant, but from April 2025, the grant includes further education colleges and sixth form colleges.
This is a one-off, non-consolidated, grant for eligible institutions to use to support cost pressures including workforce recruitment and retention. Payments will be made in June/July.
Allocations will be calculated by applying a percentage uplift of 3.55% to all eligible institutions’ total programme funding. Full details
here.
In the academic year commencing September 2025, the grant will be rolled into the national funding rate that applies to all 16-19 institutions as part of their programme funding.
While we welcome the change to include all post-16 institutions, which applies consistency, we remain extremely concerned about the adequacy of the grant to meet current financial challenges.
Rolling the grant into the national funding rate from September 2025, makes sense but it exposes the paucity of 'new' money that has been allocated.
The national learner rate for 2025/26 has been uplifted by 3.78% in total, compared to 2024/25. The vast majority of this increase is the baking in of the post-16 grant.