RFA CEO AND CO-FOUNDER MICHELE JOLIN PRAISES BIPARTISANSHIP AND PORTIONS OF BILL THAT MAKE FEDERAL EDUCATION PROGRAMS MORE EVIDENCE-BASED
Today, following the U.S. Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions (HELP) Committee’s reporting out of the bipartisan Every Child Achieves Act, a reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA), Results for America CEO and Co-Founder Michele Jolin issued the following statement praising lawmakers for taking bipartisan action to make federal education programs more evidence-based.
“The bipartisan Every Child Achieves Act includes several important provisions that would help create a critical evidence base about what works in education and support both states and school districts in using that data to improve outcomes for our nation’s students,” said Michele Jolin, CEO and Co-Founder of Results for America. “These provisions build on the growing momentum for a Moneyball approach to governing. We thank the Senators from both sides of the aisle who are helping to improve the impact of federal investment in education through better use of data, evidence and evaluation.”
Specifically, the legislation would take several steps to improve student outcomes through the use of data and evidence, including:
- Investing up to 0.5 percent of ESEA program funds in evaluations except ESEA Title I and programs that already have an evaluation set-aside;
- Allowing states and school districts to support Pay for Success initiatives with state and local drop-out prevention funds (Title I, Part D) or local funds for school safety and health (Title IV, Part A);
- Authorizing “Grants for Education Innovation and Research” to develop, implement, replicate, or scale up testing of evidence-based innovations to improve student outcomes; and
- Defining “evidence-based” within ESEA programs and calling on states and school districts to use their formula and competitive grant funds for “evidence-based” interventions.