Start Strong for community preschools

Resources

Information flyer: Fee Relief in Community and Mobile Preschools (PDF 237KB)

Accessing fee relief

Families must complete a declaration form to access fee relief. This form will help families inform your service whether they would like to receive fee relief from your service.

Families will need to complete a form for each service their child is attending. Declaration forms should be completed prior to children attending your service in 2024. This will ensure fee relief is provided to families from the first week their child attends your service in 2024.

To assist services to communicate the declaration form to families, a template letter that services can download and place on their letterhead is available. This letter explains the process to access fee relief and how and why the declaration form must be filled out.

Frequently Asked Questions

Frequently asked questions are available on the 2024 Start Strong for Community Preschools FAQs webpage.

Start Strong sector consultation summary report

Start Strong Sector Consultation Summary Report: Community Preschool Services - September 2022 (PDF 97KB)

Funding planning tool

The Start Strong for Community Preschools Planning Tool (XLSX 135KB) (formerly known as the funding calculator) is available to assist community preschool services to estimate their Start Strong funding for the 2024 funding period. Services can use the information contained in their August 2023 Preschool Census Summary Report to estimate their funding.

Please note that the 2024 Start Strong Guidelines for Community Preschools introduced changes to Socio-Economic Indexes for Areas (SEIFA) to better reflect service communities and make sure that funding is provided to where it is needed the most.

To help preschool providers adjust to these changes the department will have transition arrangements in place for the full 2024 calendar year (12 months). No service will be worse off in 2024 because of SEIFA classification changes. Negative adjustments will not be applied for services whose new SEIFA decile leads to a funding reduction for 2024. Instead, the 2024 funding allocation for these services will be based on existing SEIFA bands and their respective funding rates.

Services can use the funding planning tool to understand if transitional arrangements apply to them by reviewing their estimated funding by SEIFA band, as well as SEIFA decile.

The transition arrangements are not built into the funding planning tool (i.e. they are not automatically displayed). Funding letters for 2024 are expected to be available the week commencing 27 November 2023 and will outline if transition arrangements are applicable.

The funding planning tool runs in Microsoft Excel 2010 and later. Users with earlier versions of Microsoft Excel may need to update Microsoft Office to avoid compatibility issues.

Please note: the amounts generated by the calculator are an estimate only and not a guarantee of funding.

Applying for Start Strong for Community Preschools funding

Approved Providers who are interested in applying for funding through Start Strong for Community Preschools should write to the department via the contact details below.

Interested organisations will need to demonstrate their eligibility for funding, analysis of local need and demand, proposed number of preschool places to be created and capability to deliver on the objectives and outcomes of Start Strong, including affordability for families.

While the department recognises that fee decisions are at the discretion of services, the department will consider affordability for families when reviewing applications for Start Strong funding. As such, new services are encouraged to ensure that fee structures do not impact negatively on preschool participation in their community.

The department seeks to finalise applications in a timely manner, and the process may take between 8 to 12 weeks. The length of time can depend on various factors, including the completeness and accuracy of information provided to the department which is used for funding calculation and assessment purposes.