This second blog post from the Investing in Girls’ Education Learning Group series examines how financing models focused on building strong government partnerships can institutionalize and scale gender-transformative approaches. While global momentum behind girls’ education continues to grow, the financing gap remains vast. Education faces an estimated annual shortfall of $97 billion dollars. Girls are often left out of budgets and policies, whether due to deprioritizing below other development goals, or at times due to unintended consequences of systems being overstretched. Innovative and blended finance tools have begun to enter the education sector, yet only a small share of blended finance transactions target education, and many remain relatively small. This reflects both the unrealized potential of these instruments and the urgency to deploy them more strategically for girls.

The Girls’ Education Learning Group, co-hosted by the Education Finance Network (EFN) and the Children’s Investment Fund Foundation (CIFF), was created to explore this challenge. Across multiple sessions, members have grappled with how catalytic philanthropic capital, government leadership, and evidence-driven implementation can work together to unlock sustainable financing for girls’ education and achieve gender-equitable outcomes. In our most recent discussions, participants converged on two essential insights about what it will take for financing to deliver its full promise for girls’ education.

Effective and sustainable financing for girls’ education depends on two elements that are mutually reinforcing. The first is the potential of innovative finance – specifically outcomes-based financing (OBF) – to incentivize results for girls by aligning public and philanthropic capital through making governments the outcome payers. The second is the co-designing of those financing models with governments to ensure that high-performing, gender-focused programs can be sustained over time and embedded within policy and budget systems.

Innovative financing has significant potential for girls’ education when designed with governments and simplified for use

Innovative financing mechanisms, particularly outcomes-based financing (OBF), offer a powerful path for advancing gender equality in education. These mechanisms can bring together governments, funders, and implementing partners around shared, verifiable results. Because accountability rests on independently measured outcomes, OBF encourages stronger collaboration, clearer incentives, and more rigorous learning. When gender-responsive indicators are included, these models strengthen the focus on girls and help systems identify which interventions deliver results at scale and for the most marginalized.

Participants noted that in OBF, co-designing with governments is a key choice that encourages governments to engage not only as oversight bodies but as eventual owners of scaled solutions. This helps ensure that gender-equitable innovations are aligned with public priorities and have clearer pathways into long-term adoption. The recent experiences of organizations such as Educate Girls, pioneer of the first Development Impact Bond (DIB) in education, illustrate how strong measurement systems, adaptive delivery models, and local leadership can combine to accelerate girls’ learning outcomes.

In addition, the Education Outcomes Fund (EOF) in Lagos is a prime example of how innovative financing flips the script on how we fund education programs, from paying for activities to paying for outcomes. EOF pools resources from governments, donors, and philanthropies to competitively award contracts to service providers. Payments are made only when agreed education outcomes, such as improved literacy and numeracy, are achieved. CIFF has played a pivotal role in shaping EOF’s Lagos Learning and Education Access Fund’s strategy and governance, alongside partners like the Lagos State Universal Basic Education Board (LASUBEB), Japan MoFA, and UBS Optimus Foundation, and has committed significant funding to support the launch of the program.

Moreover, DIBs take this further, bringing together investors, outcome funders, and service providers. Investors provide upfront capital for interventions, and outcome funders repay them with returns only if pre-defined social outcomes are met. This model shifts risk away from governments and donors while incentivizing performance and innovation. CIFF has supported DIBs in areas like poverty alleviation and girls’ education, leveraging partnerships to scale cost-effective solutions.

At the same time, participants emphasized that these innovative financing instruments remain more complex than they need to be. High transaction costs, complex contracting structures, and requirements for sophisticated data systems can discourage participation from both governments and implementers. Philanthropy therefore can play a critical role in reducing these barriers. Catalytic funding can help de-risk early stages, support the development of robust outcomes measurement systems, and enable governments to test gender-responsive financing models in a lower-pressure environment. When streamlined and supported through early-stage philanthropic investment, OBF becomes more accessible and more valuable as a tool for system reform.

Sustainability and scale depend on co-designing with government and building their capacities to enable gender-equitable delivery

Alongside financing innovations, the Learning Group reaffirmed that long-term sustainability emerges when programs are built with governments from the outset. Examples such as VVOB in South Africa and the Zizi Afrique Foundation in Kenya showed that co-creation with ministries and education authorities helps ensure alignment with national priorities, curriculum frameworks, budget processes, and accountability systems. When governments see themselves as partners shaping gender-responsive programming (GRP), integration and long-term ownership become more feasible.

Participants emphasized that contextualized evidence and openly available tools play an essential role. Leveraging evidence that reflects local realities allows governments to adapt programs to their own policy environments rather than replicating isolated pilots. When learning data is shared across partners, it can support teacher training, curriculum reform, and planning decisions in indirect ways that reinforce system-wide change.

A key example is how CIFF’s investments illustrate how solutions can be embedded in policy and become part of long-term systems: from integrating adolescent cash transfers into Kenya’s social protection architecture to supporting programs that transition from NGO-led pilots to government-led scale. The Sierra Leone Education Innovation Challenge (SLEIC), launched in 2022 as the world’s largest education outcomes fund at the time, set out to improve learning in some of Sierra Leone’s most challenged primary schools. The program, co-funded by the government, donors, and philanthropies, paid providers for measurable improvements in learning. After three years, the results are striking: SLEIC delivered learning gains that outperformed roughly 70% of comparable programs globally, demonstrating that OBF can work at national scale, even in a low-income, fragile setting. Above all, it reinforces how government leadership, adaptive management, and ecosystem collaboration were essential to success. 

Strengthening the capacity of the middle tier of the education system also emerged as a recurring theme. District and provincial offices are often responsible for implementation at scale, yet they may lack the support needed to manage new gender-focused programs. Models that combine online and in-person professional development, peer networks, and coaching for school leaders can help build a workforce that is able to deliver gender-responsive approaches across many schools. Participants also underscored the value of engaging caregivers, communities, and school leadership teams, since lasting gender-equitable change requires shifts in values, norms, and behaviors alongside technical reforms.

Globally, other mechanisms are gaining traction. Social Impact Bonds in the UK, the Global Financing Facility for Women, Children and Adolescents, and the Education Outcomes Fund’s expanding portfolio in countries like Tunisia, Rwanda, South Africa, and Nigeria all demonstrate how outcomes-based models can mobilize new resources and drive systemic change. These approaches share common threads: rigorous measurement, risk-sharing, and a relentless focus on what works for learners.

A standout example is CIFF India’s Skill Impact Bond (SIB), which has enrolled over 29,000 candidates, with 74% of them women, and links payments to verified outcomes such as certification, job placement, and retention. SIB’s success in improving women’s employment rates and influencing national policy shows how OBF can deliver meaningful results and drive ecosystem-wide change.

Therefore, philanthropy has a significant opportunity to support governments in these efforts. Beyond funding delivery, philanthropic partners can help identify which types of interventions are best suited for co-design with governments, drawing lessons from both education and other sectors (e.g., health). Philanthropic support positions governments to lead solutions that are contextually grounded, financially viable, and strongly oriented toward girls’ learning outcomes.

What’s next to advance girls’ education?

The Learning Group reinforces that financing for girls’ education is most powerful when it combines innovative financing tools with strong, early, and intentional government partnerships. Innovative financing ensures accountability and results, while co-designing with governments guarantees ownership and sustainability. Together, they create education systems that are results-driven, locally anchored, and built to last. The challenge now is scaling these models across regions and sectors, turning promising pilots into transformative programs that reach millions of girls.

In other words, these approaches work, so the question is how quickly we can make them the norm. By simplifying OBF, investing in measurement systems, and strengthening capacity across the education system, the sector can accelerate progress for girls and embed gender equity into national education agendas. 

As we look ahead, all actors, but especially philanthropic funders, have a vital role in shaping this landscape. Their willingness to invest in gender-responsive, government-aligned financing models can help move the field beyond pilots and toward solutions that are owned by countries and sustained through public systems. Join the conversation, share your ideas, and help us build a future where every girl learns, thrives, and leads.