September 16, 2024

Why is evidence so critical to solving our nation’s greatest challenges? Who are the subject matter experts and policy leaders that build and use evidence to make decisions? On September 3rd, the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) and the Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) addressed these questions in a Celebration of the Federal Evidence Community in the Eisenhower Executive Office Building. The event brought together White House leaders, senior agency decision-makers, researchers, and agency Evaluation Officers and their staff to celebrate accomplishments to date and look ahead to future opportunities for Federal evidence-based policymaking.

Assistant to the President for Science and Technology and Director of OSTP Arati Prabhakar opened the event, reflecting on why we must use evidence to solve our most pressing challenges. By situating recent progress bringing evidence to bear on policy-making in the context of historic shifts toward evidence use, she underscored the current contributions and boundless potential that this work offers. OMB Deputy Director for Management Jason Miller highlighted agencies’ progress to build and use evidence since passage of the Evidence Act, as well as key OMB-led accomplishments to promote evidence building, evidence use by leaders, research partnerships, and transparency around evidence planning. OMB’s Evidence Team Lead Diana Epstein followed by recognizing and celebrating agencies’ hard work to date and highlighted opportunities to enhance how evaluation is integrated into and used throughout the Government.

OSTP’s Principal Deputy Director for Science, Society, and Policy Kei Koizumi then moderated three panel conversations highlighting leading evidence successes from across the Federal landscape, beginning with Chris Logan, Deputy Associate Administrator for Resilience at Federal Emergency Management Administration (FEMA) and Rebecca Kruse, Assistant Director for Evaluation at the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), who discussed how FEMA and DHS are strengthening the effectiveness of their grant programs through a systematic approach to evidence building and evaluation. Department of Education Deputy Secretary Cindy Marten and the Acting Director of the Institute of Education Sciences Matthew Soldner shared wide-ranging examples of the important role rigorous evaluation plays in informing policy within the Department of Education. Finally, Ben Page, Deputy Assistant Secretary for Economic Development and Chief Operating Officer within the U.S. Economic Development Administration, and Barbara Downs, Evaluation Officer of the U.S. Census Bureau, both in the Department of Commerce, described innovative uses of administrative and statistical data to learn from and shape program and policy design.

Closing out the event, OMB Deputy Director Nani Coloretti noted how she relies on evidence regularly in her decision-making. She offered praise and encouragement to staff across the Federal Government doing this work and stressed how much we need evidence to improve the lives of the American people. In reflecting on noteworthy examples where policy changes were driven by new evidence, she emphasized how even though this work takes time to do well, the insights it generates can lead to significant change – change that “happens gradually and then suddenly.”

Participants enjoyed taking this time together to share their experiences, celebrate their collective accomplishments to date, and reflect on all that has been done to improve how our Government builds evidence and uses it for decision-making. Central to these successes are the dedicated public servants and committed leaders who do the hard work day in and day out to make evidence-based policymaking in the Federal Government a reality. While much work remains, this event offered a unique opportunity to bring this community together to be recognized for past successes and look ahead to future opportunities.

Tags:

• Evaluation
• Evidence-Use

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