ASF has negotiated with accredited education and training providers across Australia to provide free or discounted executive management, mentoring and training programs in a range of management disciplines to officers and staff of nonprofit organisations. These providers include universities, for-profit colleges, professional services associations and businesses with in-house education and training programs. In many cases the access to such courses is at little or no marginal cost to the providers and offers them a low cost opportunity for expanding their community involvement.  

ASF intends to provide scholarships to employees and to volunteers who play a significant role in their NFP organisation, whereby the completion of the applied course would benefit their employing NFP organisation.  The ATO defines a NFP organisation whereby "any profit (surplus) the organisation makes goes back into the operation of the organisation to carry out its purposes and is not distributed to any of its members."  Some of the categories of activity for NFP organisations include:  heath & welfare; international aid; environment; education & research; and culture, sport & recreation.

Scholarships are offered in such practical disciplines as finance and accounting, leadership and management, IT, marketing and fundraising, non-profit board governance, leadership mentoring, executive coaching, HR and related training, etc. The range and type of course offerings is continually expanding and include full and part time study, and participation in in-house programs provided by large corporations and professional services firms. Applicants must always meet the specific course and training requirements stipulated by ASF’s providers and sponsors – see FAQ and the individual scholarships sections for further details.

At regular intervals through the year ASF publicises the availability of new rounds of scholarships via on-line communications to a large number of nonprofit organisations and invites applications. Applications for these scholarships are processed on-line and considered by Scholarship Committees, located in each capital city, in conjunction with Rotary International and other ASF partners. Successful applications are then recommended by these committees to the Council of ASF for approval.

ASF provides access to the free courses and substantially discounted courses.

ASF also provides Australian philanthropists with low cost access to the ASF grant and assessment process to help them make their own capability building grants. Corporations, trusts and foundations, as well as individuals with PPFs, can provide their own scholarships in cash or kind, using the nation-wide ASF scholarship application and assessment committee network in each capital city. The publicising, on-line grants and scholarships application processing and ongoing monitoring of successful applicants is free of charge and effectively outsourced to ASF.