Providers of services which have been previously approved for funding under Start Strong for Community Preschools in earlier years generally do not need to re-apply. Data available or provided to the department, including details from previous applications, the National registers (available on ACECQA’s website), the Annual Preschool Census and other sources, is generally sufficient to confirm continued eligibility.

In limited circumstances the department may ask providers to re-apply for funding where significant provider or service changes have occurred, including, but not limited to, service delivery changes (e.g. adding additional services or reducing the community preschool service), relocation of the preschool with a significant change to the service being provided.

Interested organisations who would like to apply for funding through Start Strong for Community Preschools should write to the department via email at ecec.funding@det.nsw.edu.au. Information on applying for Start Strong funding is also available on the Start Strong for Community Preschools webpage. The department accepts funding applications throughout the program year (1 January to 31 December 2025). Under limited circumstances, the department may allow a provider to submit an application before the program year.

The department expects fees to be maintained at fee levels of the previous years where fees were charged to families, adjusted for the Consumer Price Index across this time period.

If services need to adjust fees above the Consumer Price Index, such as due to reasonable increases in operating costs, evidence must be retained to support the fee increase.

The department will be monitoring daily fees and additional charges, through the Annual Preschool Census, annual reporting, and compliance processes. For more information, please refer to Section 5 Fee guidelines in the program guidelines . Approved providers are not permitted to increase their service fees to offset the benefits of the fee relief payment.

Community preschool services funded under Start Strong are required to give equal priority of access to children outlined in Section 3.3. There is no order of priority assigned to the cohorts identified in Section 3.3. The priority of access guidelines are intended to assist services in allocating places to children in the greatest need.

While enrolment decisions are at the discretion of the service, the department encourages services to consider the community needs and maximise the number of children enrolled for 600 hours. Services should also consider the hours children are enrolled at other funded services when making enrolment decisions.

Children who are 6 years old will be eligible for funding where they have been granted a formal exemption from the NSW Department of Education and have a Certificate of Exemption. The exemption should be in place by the time the child turns 6 years old.

It is the responsibility of families to seek formal exemption from the NSW Department of Education. Refer to the Exemption from school procedures for further information.

Start Strong for Community Preschools funding, including fee relief, is based on enrolment data – not attendance. Children who are enrolled on days considered pupil free days, public holidays, and professional development days will have the hours counted towards 600 hours per year of preschool education.

Services can decide to align with the NSW public education pupil free day calendar.

Services have discretion on the fees charged for pupil free days, professional development days, and public holidays.

Start Strong funding, including fee relief is based on enrolment data – not attendance.

If a child is enrolled at your service and does not attend due to reasons such as medical conditions or extended holidays, the funding payment for this enrolment does not get impacted due to low attendance. It is the service’s business decision to decide the process regarding holding the position for the family.

From 2025 all Start Strong for Community Preschool funded services will have funding calculations based on 2021 SEIFA Index of Relative Socio-economic Disadvantage (IRSD) Deciles. The department uses the 2021 SEIFA IRSD to calculate and deliver funding to the community and mobile preschools sector in an equitable manner.

The 2025 Program Payment funding for your service will be based on your service’s SEIFA decile and the respective funding rates. Information on SEIFA deciles and funding rates is available in the Start Strong for Community Preschool Guidelines (see Appendix 1.1).

Start Strong funding, including fee relief funding, is paid to services who then pass it on to families in the form of reduced fees.

While families can access fee relief at only one service for their child, there will be no impact on program payment funding amounts for both services that the child attends. Each service will be provided the full allocation of program payment in line with the program funding calculations for each eligible enrolment.

Start Strong for Community Preschool funding is delivered on a calendar year basis. Funding will be paid on a quarterly basis, with allocations based on the Annual Preschool Census held in August 2024.

Funding is expected to follow the schedule below:

• December 2024 (Quarter 1) for period January – March 2025
• April 2025 (Quarter 2) for period April – June 2025
• July 2025 (Quarter 3) for period July - September 2025
• October 2025 (Quarter 4) for period October – December 2025.

The funding planning tool will be available on the department's website shortly, and can be used to estimate your service's 2025 funding.

The funding rates outlined in Start Strong program guidelines do not include GST.

If your provider is GST registered, you will receive funding payments that include GST. Conversely, if your provider is not GST registered, you will receive payments without GST.

All children aged 3 years old and above, who have a birthday on or before 31 July 2025 are eligible for the program and fee relief payment. In addition, as per Section 3.2 of the Start Strong for Community Preschool program guidelines, a child will need to:

• be attending an eligible early childhood education program
• not be in compulsory schooling.

Children who are 6 years old will be eligible for funding where they have been granted a formal exemption from the NSW Department of Education and have a Certificate of Exemption.

To ensure that all eligible children are getting access to 600 hours of low or no cost preschool, regardless of the setting in which they receive it, fee relief can only be accessed from one service at a time. This means families cannot access 2 rounds of fee relief.

At each service their child is enrolled, parents/legal guardians must complete a declaration form to nominate which service they will access the fee relief from. For mixed service centres, such as services who deliver a preschool program in both Long Day Care and Community Preschool settings at the same premises, families will need to nominate which preschool program they will access fee relief for.

Families must complete the declaration form prior to fee relief being applied.

Community and mobile preschool services will need to complete consent forms in addition to the declaration form. Refer to Section 6.2 of the guidelines for further information.

Services are permitted to distribute the consent and declaration forms to families digitally, including in enrolment packs and child care management systems, provided the content and structure of the forms are not altered. Services choosing to use digital forms must ensure all record keeping, identity verification, and electronic signature requirements are met.

The department is not responsible for any issues arising from the use of altered or non-standard forms.

Services must provide parents/legal guardians with declaration and consent forms and retain completed forms for auditing purposes

Families cannot access fee relief unless they complete a fee relief declaration form. Services are encouraged to work with families to understand any concerns or barriers to completing the declaration forms to support all eligible children to receive the fee relief.

Services should record why a family has not been able to complete a declaration form.

Declaration forms should be completed prior to children attending your service in 2025. This will ensure fee relief is provided to families from their first week of attendance.

Services can refer families to the Start Strong for families page for a summary of fee relief information.

Families can only access fee relief at one community preschool, mobile preschool or long day care service at any given time. At each service their child is enrolled, parents/legal guardians must complete a declaration form to nominate which service they will access the fee relief from.

Services are not responsible for repaying any fee relief funding provided to families who have incorrectly asked for it at their service. The NSW Department of Education will monitor access to fee relief through fee relief data sumissions in 2025.

When a family wishes to change their nominated service to claim fee relief, the family must:

• ensure the other service is participating in the Start Strong program
• complete a new declaration form and return it to the current service indicating that the family has chosen another service to receive fee relief
• complete another declaration form for the new service indicating the family chooses this service to receive fee relief
• all of these steps should be completed prior to the new service applying fee relief for the family.

Service providers are required to retain all completed declaration forms for auditing purposes. Please refer to your services’ Terms and conditions for more information.

Families can only access fee relief from one service at a time. Where a family has mistakenly claimed fee relief from 2 different services at the same time, service providers should instruct the family to complete 2 new declaration forms indicating which service they nominate to access fee relief from.

Services are not responsible for repaying any fee relief funding provided to families who have incorrectly asked for it at their service.

Reserved fee relief funds are fee relief funds which have not been utilised because there are fewer children claiming fee relief at your service than you have been funded for.

It is recommended that you consider the number of children claiming fee relief at your service at the beginning of each term to identify fee relief funds that should be quarantined as ‘reserved fee relief funds’. Once reserved fee relief funds have been identified you may then consider if any changes in enrolments during each term lead to the identified reserved fee relief funds becoming surplus fee relief funds.

Refer to Section 4.2 Reserved fee relief funds and changes in enrolments of the 2025 Start Strong for Community Preschools program guidelines for more information.

Surplus fee relief funds are:

• what remains of a child’s fee relief allocation after their daily fees are reduced as much as possible. Depending on your service’s fee structure there may be no surplus funds (for example, if your daily fees are higher than the child’s allocation of daily fee relief).
• reserved fee relief funds that have become surplus fee relief funds due to changes in enrolments throughout the year. For more information refer to Section 4.2 Reserved fee relief funds and changes in enrolments of the 2025 Start Strong for Community Preschools program guidelines.

If a previously vacant enrolment place is filled partway through a term, any fee relief funding that was reserved for the weeks prior to the enrolment being filled (in the same term) can be considered surplus fee relief funds and be expended as per the program guidelines Section 4.2 Fee Relief Payment spending rules.

If an enrolment place is vacated partway through a term, that place's remaining fee relief funding for the remainder of the term must be reserved (unless an eligible child is enrolled and wants to claim fee relief). If, at the end of that term, the enrolment place has not been filled, the remaining funds for that term can be considered surplus fee relief funds. These can be expended as per the program guidelines Section 4.2 Fee Relief Payment spending rules.

For more information, refer to the 2025 Start Strong for Community Preschools program guidelines and scenarios.

The department understands that some providers may have a surplus at the end of their reporting period, which needs to be returned to the department according to the Terms and Conditions. Surplus refers to the program payment surplus and any surplus fee relief remaining after all fees and/ or charges are reduced to zero for families accessing fee relief at the service. Refer to Section 4 Spending rules and activities for more information on spending rules.

Surpluses will be identified and validated through the annual acquittal process, at which point services can apply to retain surpluses above the nominated thresholds.

Services that have an operational need to retain the surplus are required to submit a form outlining their need to retain the surplus amount as per Section 6.6 of the program guidelines.

Providers can contact the department to request the necessary form by sending an email to ecec.funding@det.nsw.edu.au. For further information refer to the Financial accountability guidance notes by program.

If your service has experienced a significant increase in enrolments, your service may be eligible to undergo a funding review. For more information, refer to the funding review guidelines

An adjustment typically takes 8-12 weeks to process, once the service has confirmed their eligibility for a review and completed an ad hoc data collection. This timeframe is subject to the completeness and accuracy of information provided to the department, which is used for application assessment and funding calculation purposes.

Yes, the digital statement is a free, collaborative tool to support the transition to school for NSW children. Where access to the digital statement is not possible, the Transition to School Digital Statement Form (PDF 434KB) can be completed.

The digital statement can be used in conjunction with other methods that are convenient for your service, families, and your local primary teachers. For more information, refer to the Transition to School Statement.

Yes, the Transition to School Digital Statement allows for a statement to be created at each service the child is enrolled in.

This allows multiple services to provide information about the child as they present at each service, providing a more holistic picture of their learning and development, and allows early childhood education and care services to meet their requirements to access Start Strong funding.

At this time, only public schools in NSW can access the Digital Statement. If a child will be attending a non-government or interstate school, services can save the statement as a PDF and share it manually.

If a parent or carer does not provide consent, you cannot create a Digital Transition to School Statement for their child. ECEC services should record when the Transition to School Digital Statement consent is not provided for eligible children accessing Start Strong funding and retain for funding compliance.

Fee Relief does not have to be returned by the family.

Yes, additional consent will need to be obtained from parents/carers for the Transition to School Digital Statement (TTSDS). ECEC services use the Transition to School Consent Form to authorise the NSW Department of Education to collect personal and health information about the child in the statement.

The TTSDS is a summative assessment of the child and provides information about the child’s development, strengths, and learning needs. The Transition to School Parent Consent form is the correct document to be uploaded onto the platform enabling the educator to then proceed with the completion of the TTSDS.