Tertiary Education and Skills (TES) Multi-Donor Trust Fund

The Tertiary Education and Skills (TES) Umbrella Multi-Donor Trust Fund is a global financing and partnership mechanism established in December 2022 and administered by the World Bank’s Education Global Practice with the support of Mastercard Foundation. It is designed to reframe, reform, and rebuild tertiary education and  skills  systems for the digital and green transformation.

TES aims to strengthen the policy framework and increase the capacity of skills and workforce development systems and institutions to expand access to inclusive, resilient, quality, and equitable post-secondary education and training services aligned to labor market and societal needs. 

TES draws on evidence-based country experience and the World Bank’s Formal Skills and Workforce Development, Youth and Adult Learning, and Higher Education knowledge to bring new insights and innovative approaches to mitigate the global skills and learning crisis.

TES fully aligns with and is committed to helping countries reach Sustainable Development Goal 4 (SDG 4) which aims to  ensure inclusive and equitable quality education and promote lifelong learning opportunities for all by 2030.

The scale of potential TES impact demonstrated through world bank project examples:

AFRICA

The Africa Centers of Excellence (ACE) Projects (US$580 million) support 70+ centers in 20 countries in Africa, so far having trained 14,000+ Masters and PhD students (30% women) in sciences.

DOMINICAN REPUBLIC

The Youth Development Project (US$25 million) trained 38,000+ at-risk youth (60% women) in vocational and life skills, producing positive impacts on formal employment and earnings.

BANGALADESH

The Skills and Training Enhancement Project (STEP) (US$190 million) improved training quality and employability of 700,000+ trainees, increasing female enrollment by 540%.