Equity by Design in Outcomes-Based Financing for Early Childhood Care and Education
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Join the second in a two-part webinar series from our Collective Learning Initiative (CLI) to explore what it takes to embed equity meaningfully within outcomes-based financing for early childhood care and education (ECCE). Through policy, financing, and implementation perspectives, this session highlights the risks, trade-offs, and design choices that determine whether OBF reaches marginalised children, or excludes them.
Session Overview
Outcomes-based financing (OBF) is increasingly being explored as a way to improve effectiveness, accountability, and impact in early childhood care and education (ECCE). Yet without deliberate attention to equity, these approaches risk reinforcing existing exclusions, particularly for children with disabilities and other marginalised groups.
This webinar explores what it means to embed equity meaningfully within outcomes-based financing for ECCE. It will examine how underlying assumptions about disability and inclusion shape outcome definitions and indicators, how domestic financing choices and data systems influence who is reached, and what equity-conscious OBF looks like in practice.
Bringing together conceptual, policy, and implementation perspectives, the session will move from how equity is framed, to how ECCE is financed, to how outcomes-based contracts are designed and delivered on the ground. Through presentations and a moderated discussion, speakers will highlight risks, trade-offs, and practical design questions to help policymakers, funders, and practitioners ensure that OBF supports inclusion rather than exclusion.
Participants will leave with a clearer understanding of:
- Why equity in OBF should be a design choice, not a technical afterthought
- How outcome and indicator selection can shape inclusion in ECCE systems
- What financing and implementation features matter most for reaching marginalised children
Speakers
- Ella Wright (Disability and Inclusion Consultant, UNICEF), who will examine how different understandings of disability and inclusion influence outcome definitions, indicators, and incentives in OBF systems.
- Dr Michelle Neuman (Senior Fellow at Results for Development and Research Affiliate at Yale Inclusion Economics), who will place OBF within the broader global landscape of ECCE financing, highlighting what current funding patterns and data gaps mean for equity.
- Siree Jongdee (Associate Director, Equitable Education Research Institute), who will present a practical case study from Thailand’s Equitable Education Fund, sharing lessons from implementing and evaluating outcomes-based contracts in early childhood development.