• The criteria and exemptions applied  are largely the same as previous years, with some small adjustments:

  Time limits to information used. If information relating to a criterion is present but more than three years old, it did not count toward a score, except for information on how foundations have consulted with communities they seek to help and how that influenced their strategies, which was limited to five years. The rationale is that three years is a usual strategic cycle and information older than that is likely to be out of date and not a reliable source of information on the foundation’s current priorities/ processes for applicants.

• Information gathered and analysed but currently not scored – if disclosed:  Diversity information on grantees or applicants
• Transparency of programmes about their eligibility criteria, decision-makers, and time-frames for with funding. This year we assessed the proportion of a foundation’s funding that have those, rather than the proportion of programmes that have them. This is to avoid a situation where a foundation would be marked down if it had (for example) one very large and transparently run programme and several less transparent but much smaller programmes.

Following the consultation, the criteria applied are largely the same as the previous year with some adjustments to the exemptions summarised here:

• Foundations under 5 staff are exempt from diversity plan criteria
• Changed from exemption for foundations under 10 staff. Rationale: 10 demographically identical staff would be something applicants would find it useful to know and understand how this is regarded by the trustees.

See the exemptions page for more detail.

Information gathered and analysed but currently not scored – if disclosed:

• Social class of staff and trustees
• Lived experience of staff or trustees
• Demographic information on applicants