Target

Context

Ethiopia has made tremendous progress in expanding access to education, but quality and equity remain persistent challenges, particularly for marginalised learners, girls, and children with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND). Weak school leadership and teacher preparation, limited data use, and uneven instructional quality have contributed to low learning outcomes and regional disparities. In 2014, half of 12-year olds in Ethipoia failed to reach the low achievement benchmark for children aged 10 years.To address these systemic gaps, the UK government funded the Technical Assistance to Reinforce GEQIP-E (TARGET) programme, a £19.5 million initiative supporting the World Bank-managed General Education Quality Improvement Programme for Equity (GEQIP-E).

Solution

The TARGET programme aimed to strengthen leadership, build delivery capacity, and improve accountability across Ethiopia’s education system. The programme collaborated with Ethiopia’s Ministry of Education and regional education bureaus to improve the quality and equity of education through four key areas:

Strengthening system capacity: Using embedded delivery and data-driven approaches, technical experts supported government agencies to improve the 1delivery of GEQIP-E.
Reforming school leadership: University coaches and teaching experts were brought in to work with school leaders to enhance their practice.
Improving school performance: TARGET provided in-service capacity building for school leaders, strengthening instructional leadership, community engagement and teacher support, embedding inclusive practices in school management; particularly in underperforming schools.
Enhancing monitoring and evaluation: The team strengthened monitoring, evaluation, and research systems at federal and regional levels, generating evidence through monitoring, evaluation and learning activities that inform the program and enhance learning outcomes.

By integrating leadership development with systemic support and evidence generation, and embedding reforms aligned with national priorities, TARGET sought to transform Ethiopia’s school system.

Impact

By 2023, 5.5 million learners had been reached and over 9,800 school leaders had been trained under TARGET in Ethiopia. Results showed significant improvements in school improvement planning, safeguarding, lesson quality, data use, and teacher attendance. Competency assessments revealed that the proportion of leaders rated “competent” or above rose from 15% to 74% in three years. In intervention schools, gender equity improved markedly, with student agreement that schools provided safe spaces for girls rising from 43% to 97% (versus a drop to 29% in non-intervention schools). SEND inclusion also advanced, with targeted lesson planning raising learning connections for this group by nearly 10%. TARGET has laid the foundation to transform Ethiopia’s education system; however, long-term impact evaluations are essential to determine the programme’s sustained effects on learning outcomes, institutional capacity, and systemic reform

TARGET demonstrates how technical assistance embedded within government systems can deliver large-scale, measurable improvements in school leadership, inclusion, and equity. Its success stems from context-specific coaching, combining leadership development with data-driven planning, and aligning reforms with national priorities. The rapid rise in leadership competency and the sharp gains in gender-sensitive and inclusive practices highlight the value of systemic support in improving the quality of education. Replicability depends on securing adequate resources and government commitment to deliver comprehensive leadership training and to strengthen monitoring and evaluation systems. Overall, TARGET provides a scalable model for strengthening national education systems in low-resource contexts through targeted technical assistance.