Our Work | EOF

Traditional education aid models reward effort. Outcomes funds reward impact.

A smarter way to fund education

Every child deserves the chance to learn and every young person deserves the skills to get a good job. Yet too often, education systems measure what goes in rather than what comes out. Budgets, enrolment, and attendance are tracked, but real learning and employability lag behind.

EOF helps governments and donors change that. We use Outcomes-Based Financing (OBF), a simple but powerful idea: Funding is tied to measurable results. Payments are made only when outcomes are achieved.

Funders only pay when results are verified. That means the focus shifts — from counting inputs like textbooks and training sessions to measuring real-world change, such as improved literacy, school readiness, and youth employment.

EOF’s Outcomes Partnership model is designed around the idea that lasting change happens when every actor in the system plays to their strengths and shares responsibility for results. By aligning different actors around common goals, EOF helps education systems shift from inputs to outcomes, from projects to partnerships, and from short-term funding to long-term impact.

A partnership built for results

Governments

define national priorities and set outcome targets.

Funders

Government entities, international donors, philanthropic actors, and corporate social impact champions provide funding for outcomes that are independently verified.

Implementing partners

from NGOs to social enterprises, deliver flexible, adaptive programmes that respond to what works on the ground.

Impact investors

can provide upfront capital to make delivery possible, sharing the risk and reward.

How it works

Impact in action

EOF’s approach is already delivering results at scale.

In Sierra Leone, 134,000 children in supported schools are learning faster than their peers — progressing at a pace equivalent to an extra year of schooling. The gender gap in literacy and numeracy has narrowed by 73%, proving that well-designed outcomes partnerships can accelerate equity and quality simultaneously.

Across five new programmes in Rwanda, South Africa, Nigeria, Tunisia, and Sierra Leone, EOF is now applying this model to early childhood, basic education, and skills for employment — mobilising over $130 million to improve opportunities for more than half a million learners.

What makes outcomes partnerships different?

Payment for Success Service providers are only paid when outcomes, like literacy gains or job placements, are achieved and verified by independent evaluators. This ensures value for money and incentivises results, not activity.

Innovation-Ready by Design

Providers have the flexibility to test and refine interventions. In Sierra Leone’s Education Innovation Challenge, five implementers worked in parallel to improve learning for 134,000 students, creating space for comparative evidence and adaptability.

Government Ownership + Systemic Focus

Unlike donor-run pilots, outcomes partnerships operate under government stewardship. Ministries set priorities and lead strategy. Gender equity, for instance, was embedded in Sierra Leone’s fund, where outcomes for girls triggered higher payments.

Scale + Accountability

With standardized contracts and data systems, outcomes partnerships allow multiple actors to collaborate under one framework, creating efficiencies, enhancing accountability, and accelerating what works.

Why it works

Beyond a financing instrument

For EOF, Outcomes-Based Financing is not an end in itself. It is a lever for transformation — a way to make education spending more effective, transparent, and accountable, while giving governments and partners the tools to deliver better outcomes at scale.

EOF doesn’t just fund programmes. We build the ecosystem that makes outcomes-based approaches possible and sustainable. Through our Learning & Engagement work, we generate evidence, strengthen capacity, and connect practitioners and policymakers across countries and sectors.

Our focus is threefold:

Generating knowledge — gathering and sharing insights from outcomes-based programmes to inform smarter education investments.
Building capacity — partnering with governments, donors, and providers to strengthen data systems, contracting, and performance management.
Fostering collaboration — convening a global community of practice through networks such as the Education Finance Network to advance outcomes-based learning.

This work ensures that lessons from each programme contribute to a broader transformation — helping governments and development partners embed results-based thinking into policy, budgeting, and delivery systems.