Gov Innovator podcast: Recent Episodes
Andy Feldman
Too often, contracting is seen as a back-office function, even though many government programs are actually implemented with contracted service providers. In reality, contracting — and contracting reforms — can be a key driver of better results in human services, including for the most vulnerable families and individuals.
We discuss specific steps in results-driven contracting with Lisa Morrison Butler, the former Commissioner of the Chicago Department of Family and Support Services (DFSS) and now the Executive Vice President and Chief Impact Officer at Results for America. She served as Commissioner of DFSS — the largest funder of human and social services in the city — for more than five years across two mayoral administrations. Under her leadership, she led an organizational transformation aimed at achieving greater overall impact, including overhauling the department’s approach to contracting.
The five main steps in DFSS’s path to results-driven contracting that we discuss are:
- Build consensus around the need for change related to contracting.
- Choose a pilot division.
- Develop a calendar to roll out reform across the department.
- Build clear goals and new expectations into each new RFP, among participating divisions.
- Adopt active contract management, including developing learning cohorts that met quarterly.
Learn more:
- To hear other Gov Innovator podcast interviews on results-driven contracting, click this link.
- Read Lisa’s “Innovator Interview” with the Harvard Kennedy School’s Government Performance Lab on her efforts to improve outcomes at Chicago’s DFSS.
The post How results-driven contracting improved outcomes for Chicago’s most vulnerable: An interview with Lisa Morrison Butler, former Commissioner, Chicago Department of Family and Support Services – Episode #202 appeared first on Gov Innovator Podcast.
When we think about what skills leaders need to be successful — such as making good decisions, regulating their emotions and stress, and forming strong and healthy relationships with others — an important foundation for those skills is mindfulness. Our guest today has deep expertise in helping people cultivate self-awareness and mindfulness in order to […]
The post Using mindfulness practices for greater self-awareness and self-improvement: Rabbi Marc Margolius, Senior Program Director, Institute for Jewish Spirituality – Episode #201 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
To celebrate our 200th interview, we are joined by one of the most respected people within the evidence and evaluation field, Dr. Naomi Goldstein, to share reflections on her 21-year career at the Administration for Children and Families (ACF) at the U.S. Department of Human Services. Dr. Goldstein (@NaomiGoldstein1) is the Deputy Assistant Secretary for Planning, […]
The post Career reflections from an evidence leader: An interview with Naomi Goldstein, Administration for Children and Families, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services – Episode #200 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
Colorado is a leader in the U.S. in terms of using evidence to guide state budget decisions, so that dollars flow to programs that are effective. It’s also a leader in terms of building evidence to better learn what works in key program areas. For example: State agencies are required by the governor’s budget office […]
The post Colorado’s nation-leading practices in using evidence to guide budget decisions: An interview with Sara Dube, Director, Results First Initiative, The Pew Charitable Trusts – Episode #199 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
An important area of innovation within higher-education policy in recent years has been tuition-free college policies — also known as Promise Programs — designed to make college more affordable and accessible. Our previous podcast interview with Professor Elizabeth Bell of Florida State University provided an overview of the topic. In this new interview, we focus […]
The post How state tuition-free college programs are spanning political divides: An interview with Michelle Miller-Adams, Senior Researcher, Upjohn Institute – Episode #198 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
Tuition-free college policies have become a cornerstone of policymakers’ efforts to expand college access, affordability, and degree attainment. The movement began at the local level with initiatives such as the Kalamazoo Promise, but has since been taken to the state level, with 21 states currently operating Promise Programs. To learn more about these important policies […]
The post How Promise Programs are expanding college access, affordability, and degree attainment: An interview with Elizabeth Bell, Florida State University – Episode #197 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
Arnold Ventures launched its evidence-based policy initiative in 2015 in large part to increase the number of social programs with strong evidence behind them. To do that, the team funds randomized controlled trials of programs in social policy whose prior evidence has shown the potential for sizable effects on educational achievement, earnings, and other important outcomes. […]
The post Insights about building credible evidence in social policy: An interview with David Anderson, Vice President of Evidence-Based Policy, Arnold Ventures – Episode #196 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
Minnesota has been identified by several good-government organizations as one of the leaders in the nation on evidence-based policymaking. The Pew Charitable Trusts, for example, has noted that “Using evidence-based policymaking has enabled Minnesota…to provide better outcomes for residents, [and] improve the way research and evidence inform the budget and policymaking processes….” One important piece of […]
The post How Minnesota’s impact evaluation unit supports evidence-based budgeting: An interview with Weston Merrick, Minnesota Management and Budget – Episode #195 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
Ohio’s Department of Education is one of the leading state agencies in the U.S. in terms of its focus on helping and encouraging school leaders to use evidence-based educational strategies and supports. For the past almost four years, Dr. Heather Boughton (@hrosemaryb) helped lead those efforts. She’s the former director of the Office of Research, […]
The post Insights on evidence use from Ohio’s Department of Education: An interview with Heather Boughton, Results for America – Episode #194 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
Anne Arundel County, Maryland, has a population of just under 600,000 and is south of Baltimore and East of Washington D.C., with the county seat being Annapolis. In 2018, under County Executive Steuart Pittman, the county launched a performance-focused office called ArundelStat. One of the key initiatives of the office so far has been developing […]
The post Developing and using agency performance plans: An interview with Elizabeth Funsch, ArundelStat Manager, Anne Arundel County in Maryland – Episode #193 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
What does it take to be a successful evaluation office within a public agency? Three things that are important are being trustworthy, being engaging, and being relentless, explains Dr. Susan Jenkins. Since 2016, Dr. Jenkins has been the Director of the Office of Performance and Evaluation at the Administration for Community Living (ACL) at the […]
The post Three keys to a successful agency evaluation office: An interview with Susan Jenkins, Director of the Office of Performance and Evaluation, Administration for Community Living, HHS – Episode #192 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
The New Hope Project was an anti-poverty program in the 1990s in Milwaukee that offered a simple but powerful pledge: If participants were willing to work full-time, they would not be poor. The program used a wage subsidy, support for child care and health insurance, and (if participants needed it) short-term subsidized employment to achieve […]
The post Lessons from New Hope for reducing poverty today: An interview with Kali Grant, Georgetown University, and Julie Kirksick, former New Hope Executive Director – Episode #191 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
New Mexico state government is a leader in the use of evidence, lead by its Legislative Finance Committee (LFC) that has been a catalyst for evidence-based budgeting, including through its participation in the Pew MacArthur Results First Initiative. In this part 2 of our interview with Charles Sallee, the Deputy Director of the Legislative Finance […]
The post Evidence-based budgeting in New Mexico: Part 2 interview with Charles Sallee, Deputy Director, Legislative Finance Committee, New Mexico – Episode #190 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
Last month, New Mexico’s Legislative Finance Committee (LFC) did something that that possibly no other legislative committee in the U.S. has done to date: It launched a “PerformanceStat” initiative. As listeners to this podcast will know, the PerformanceStat process was pioneered in New York City for policing and then expanded to other government settings, as […]
The post Launching LegisSTAT in New Mexico: Part 1 interview with Charles Sallee, Deputy Director, Legislative Finance Committee, New Mexico – Episode #189 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
John Kotter (@JohnPKotter) is one of the most respected thinkers on the topics of leadership and change. He is professor emeritus at the Harvard Business School, a widely-read author, and the founder of Kotter International, a management consulting firm. Many of you might know his book Leading Change, which is a classic on the topic […]
The post Leading successful change initiatives: An interview with John Kotter, professor emeritus at the Harvard Business School and founder of Kotter International – Episode #188 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
Idaho’s Office of Performance Evaluations (OPE) was created in 1994 and is a nonpartisan, independent office that serves the Idaho legislature by conducting evaluations of state agencies and programs, as well as studies of key policy issues. With its staff of seven evaluators, plus its director, OPE’s mission is to promote confidence and accountability in […]
The post Insights from Idaho’s Office of Performance Evaluations: An interview with Rakesh Mohan, Director – Episode #187 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
A logic model is a detailed visual representation of an organization or program that expresses the organization’s theory of change. It’s useful for getting a clear and shared understanding of how an office, division, program or initiative works. But what important questions should an organization ask once its created a logic model? To find out, […]
The post Five questions public agencies should ask to put their logic models to work: An interview with Cynthia Phillips, former Acting Chief Evaluation Officer, National Science Foundation – Episode #186 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
What leads decision makers to decide to implement or scale up a program? Research evidence may be one factor, but, as we know, lots of other factors can play in as well. Three of those factors are what are called cognitive biases, including: confirmation bias status quo bias bandwagon bias Understanding those biases — which […]
The post Three cognitive biases that can influence decision makers’ use of evidence about what works: An interview with Ariel Kalil, University of Chicago – Episode #185 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
Tennessee’s Office of Evidence and Impact was created in 2019 by Governor Bill Lee. The office works with the Governor’s office and with Tennessee’s executive agencies to use data and evidence to help decision makers invest in programs that work for Tennesseans. To learn more about the office’s work and what lessons it provides for […]
The post Insights from Tennessee’s Office of Evidence and Impact: An interview with Christin Lotz, Director – Episode #184 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
A new policy brief examines the research evidence behind tutoring and what design principles for tutoring have shown to be important for boosting K-12 student achievement. The report is titled Accelerating Student Learning with High-Dosage Tutoring. It’s coauthored by Dr. Carly Robinson, Dr. Matthew Kraft and Dr. Susanna Loeb of the Annenberg Institute at Brown […]
The post Boosting student achievement with high-dosage tutoring: An interview with Carly Robinson and Matthew Kraft, Brown University – Episode #183 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
Governments at all levels are increasingly using research findings from behavioral economics and other behavioral sciences to improve program and agency outcomes. These interventions and program changes draw on how people process information and make decisions and can often be implemented quickly and at little cost. One way to help support the use of behavioral […]
The post Launching a behavioral insights community of practice within a public agency: An interview with Melissa Leal, Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment – Episode #182 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
What evidence-based strategies can you use to more effectively craft communications with practical purposes, so that busy people respond and take needed action? We get insights from Dr. Todd Rogers (@Todd_Rogers_), a behavioral scientist and professor of public policy at the Harvard Kennedy School. His work applies behavioral science insights and methods to understand important […]
The post How to communicate so that busy people respond and take action: An interview with Todd Rogers, behavioral scientist and professor, Harvard Kennedy School – Episode #181 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
The California Policy Lab (@CAPolicyLab) was launched in January 2017 with a mission to create partnerships between researchers at two of California’s leading universities — UCLA and UC Berkeley — and California’s state and local government agencies. The goal: to generate scientific evidence that solves California’s most urgent problems, including the issues of homelessness, poverty, […]
The post How the California Policy Lab is helping state and local agencies tackle homelessness, poverty and other key policy challenges: An interview with Janey Rountree and Evan White, Executive Directors – Episode #180 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
How can public agencies build credible evidence about what works to help move the needle on important social policy challenges? It’s often a multi-step, iterative process. A good example is the efforts across the past two administrations by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) – in particular, their efforts to help support […]
The post Lessons from HUD about building evidence on important social policy issues: An interview with Calvin Johnson, Deputy Assistant Secretary for Research, Evaluation and Monitoring at HUD – Episode #179 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
The Foundations for Evidence-Based Policymaking Act (Evidence Act) was enacted in early 2019 and has led a wide range of federal agencies to take new steps in building and using evidence, including developing learning agendas. The Act, however, didn’t come with new funding, so resources are likely a constraint in many agencies in doing this […]
The post How federal agencies can use IPAs to bolster evidence capacity and help implement the Evidence Act: An interview with Dayanand Manoli, Professor, Georgetown University – Episode #178 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
North Carolina’s Office of Strategic Partnerships was launched at the end of 2018 under Governor Roy Cooper with a mission to enhance partnerships between state government and North Carolina’s research and philanthropic sectors. As its website notes, “This includes elevating the State’s internal capacity to use and generate evidence in its policy and programmatic functions.” […]
The post The role of North Carolina’s Office of Strategic Partnerships: An interview with Jenni Owen, Director of Strategic Partnerships, North Carolina – Episode #177 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
The State of Colorado under the previous Governor, John Hickenlooper, had a multifaceted performance-improvement strategy that included performance management, operational improvements and talent development, among other elements. That work continues today under current Governor Jared Polis. We look back at the previous administration to draw lessons for other states. We’re joined by David Padrino. He served […]
The post Colorado’s performance management strategy under Gov. Hickenlooper: An interview with David Padrino, former Chief Performance Officer, Colorado – Episode #176 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
In King County, Washington, under Executive Dow Constantine and the County Council, equity and social justice has been an important focus of the county’s work. That includes the launch in 2015 of an Office of Equity and Social Justice and the creation of its strategic plan, designed to help the county become a place where […]
The post King County, Washington’s Equity and Social Justice Strategic Plan: An interview with Arun Sambataro, King County – Episode #175 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
The nonprofit Results for America has been an important advocate of — and catalyst for — evidence-based policy and decision making over the last decade. It recently released two new resources: The 2020 Invest in What Works Federal Standard of Excellence (click to see the federal standard and the press release), as well as a […]
The post Investing in what works at the federal level: An interview with Jed Herrmann, Vice President for State and Federal Policy Implementation, Results for America – Episode #174 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
Montgomery County, located just north of Washington D.C. is a leader in the use of performance management, including through its CountyStat initiative, drawing on the model of other PerformanceStat efforts. Its reputation for results-focused government continues today under County Executive Marc Elrich, who has been in that role since 2018. To learn more about the […]
The post Insights from nearly a decade of CountyStat: An interview with Dave Gottesman, CountyStat Manager, Montgomery County, Maryland – Episode #173 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
Administrative data – in other words, big data produced by public agencies and programs – is a valuable tool for program evaluation, research and analysis that can help improve government performance and tackle our nation’s pressing challenges. How can we enable more qualified researchers and government program managers to security and more easily access those […]
The post Unlocking the power of big data to catalyze evidence-based policy: An interview with Amy O’Hara, Georgetown University – Episode #172 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
What insights can public leaders gain from leading companies about building a culture of experimentation? To find out, we’re joined by Stefan Thomke, the author of the new book Experimentation Works: The Surprising Power of Business Experiments. Dr. Thomke is the William Barclay Harding Professor of Business Administration at Harvard Business School and has published […]
The post Creating a culture of experimentation within organizations: An interview with Stefan Thomke, Harvard Business School – Episode #171 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
Attracting a police force from diverse backgrounds is one important step in ensuring that citizens are well served by their police departments and have trust in the police. But what steps can police departments take that are effective in achieving that goal? The Behavioral Insights Team, in conjunction with the What Works Cities Initiative, set […]
The post Using behavioral insights to help recruit diverse police candidates: An interview with Elizabeth Linos, University of California, Berkeley – Episode #170 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
Over the last two years, the Small Business Administration has made laudable progress in building and using evidence in order to learn what works and help programs improve. That includes launching an evaluation office and a chief data officer role within the CFO’s office, as well as creating a learning agenda to identify priority research […]
The post How the Small Business Administration became a leader in evidence-based decision making: An interview with Jason Bossie, Director, Office of Performance Management, SBA – Episode #169 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
It has been estimated that more than half of Americans are saving too little to support an adequate lifestyle if they plan to retire at age 65. It was economist and recent Nobel prize winner Richard Thaler who suggested a fix: Make payroll retirement savings plans available to everyone and then by add design features […]
The post How Oregon’s auto-enrollment IRA program, OregonSaves, helps state residents save for retirement: An interview with Lisa Massena, Executive Director, OregonSaves – Episode #168 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
Low-income and first-generation students enroll in and complete college at much lower rates than their more advantaged peers. This is particularly problematic because of the strong link between educational attainment and subsequent earnings, underscoring the need to find effective strategies that promote persistence and degree attainment. We profile two such programs that are making an important […]
The post Two promising strategies to promote college success for disadvantaged students: An interview with Lindsay Page, University of Pittsburgh, and Michael Weiss, MDRC – Episode #167 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services recently launched a pilot version of a new initiative called the Data Science CoLab, an eight-week-long data science training program. The first class, which kicked off in October 2017, included 25 employees from different agencies within HHS and with different levels of knowledge about using data. Participants applied […]
The post How HHS’s Data Science CoLab catalyzes employee innovation: An interview with Will Yang, CoLab Director, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services – Episode #166 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
The Bipartisan Budget Act of 2018, passed by Congress and signed by the President on February 9th, 2018, contains several noteworthy bright spots in the use of data and evidence-based policy. Those wins suggest there is continuing bipartisan support in Washington for using evidence, data and innovation to improve the results and cost-effectiveness of Federal […]
The post Wins for data and evidence-based policy in the bipartisan budget deal: An interview with Nick Hart, Bipartisan Policy Center – Episode #165 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
A small but growing number of federal departments and agencies have created evaluation policies that describe the principles that those agencies seek to promote when they conduct program evaluations. Those principles can include rigor, relevance, transparency, independence, and ethics. To learn more about evaluation policies and why they are useful to federal agencies, we are […]
The post Why evaluation policies are useful to results-focused federal agencies: An interview with Naomi Goldstein, HHS, and Molly Irwin, DOL – Episode #164 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
How can program managers within public agencies — whether local, state or federal — use random assignment (in other words, a lottery) within programs to build evidence that can strengthen results and improve customer service? A good example comes from South Carolina. Its Medicaid program is administered through Managed Care Organizations, which offer different health care […]
The post How program managers can use random assignment (i.e., a lottery) to build evidence that can improve customer service: An interview with Matthew Notowidigdo, Northwestern University – Episode #163 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
As the new report “Putting the Experiment Back in the Experimental Sites Initiative” discusses, the U.S. Department of Education’s “Ex Sites” initiative — in place in one form or another since the mid-1980s — is designed to allow the Department to grant flexibility to institutions of higher education to test and evaluate potential federal policy changes, […]
The post Reforming the federal Experimental Sites initiative to better learn what works in higher ed: An interview with Amy Laitinen and Clare McCann, New America – Episode #162 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
The partnership between Stanford University and the San Francisco Unified School District is one of the best examples of a partnership between a university and a school district. Launched in 2009, the partnership matches researchers from Stanford’s Graduate School of Education with district leaders to create research projects to directly inform the school district’s work […]
The post Insights from a leading researcher-practitioner partnership, between Stanford University and San Francisco’s school district: An interview with Laura Wentworth, California Education Partners – Episode #161 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
While Democrats and Republicans can’t seem to agree on much these days, there was a bright spot for bipartisanship recently: Republican Speaker of the House Paul Ryan and Democratic Senator Patty Murray joined together to praise the recommendations of the Commission on Evidence-Based Policymaking (CEP), which Ryan and Murray launched last year. The Commission was […]
The post A primer on the Commission on Evidence-Based Policymaking’s recommendations: An interview with Nick Hart, Bipartisan Policy Center – Episode #160 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
Many interventions that aim to increase the cognitive or socioemotional skills of children and adolescents have shown positive results, but far too often their impacts quickly disappear as children get older. Some programs, in contrast, have shown longer-lasting effects. In a new study published in the Journal of Research on Educational Effectiveness, Greg Duncan and […]
The post Strategies to sustain program impacts for children and adolescents: An interview with Greg Duncan, Professor, University of California, Irvine – Episode #159 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
Social Impact Bonds, also called Pay for Success projects in the U.S., draw on private sources of capital to fund preventive services, with governments acting as the outcome funders, paying back the money with a profit if specific targets are met. The approach started in the U.K. and is now being used in many different […]
The post The use of impact bonds around the world: An interview with Emily Gustafsson-Wright, Fellow, Center for Universal Education, The Brookings Institution – Episode #158 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
The bipartisan Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA) was enacted in December 2015. ESSA gives states more opportunities to design their own educational systems, while also encouraging and sometimes requiring them to use evidence-based approaches that can help improve student outcomes. Our guest today, Thomas Kane, joins us for part two of our conversation about how states […]
The post How states can use ESSA to focus education spending on what works: An interview with Tom Kane, Professor, Harvard Graduate School of Education – Episode #157 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
Project Evident (@project_evident) launched earlier this year to help nonprofit leaders and their funders develop and implement multi-year evidence-building plans – plans that can help those nonprofits to provide evidence-based programs. The effort is lead by Kelly Fitzsimmons, formerly of the Edna McConnell Clark Foundation, and Scott Cody, formerly of Mathematica. One of the underlying motivations […]
The post Helping nonprofits build and use evidence through Project Evident: An interview with Kelly Fitzsimmons, Founder and Managing Director, Project Evident – Episode #156 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
The Connecticut Green Bank (@CTGreenBank) is designed to help mobilize more private investment and accelerate the growth of green energy, such as solar power, in order to create jobs, reduce greenhouse gas emissions, and lower energy bills. It is the nation’s first state-sponsored bank to promote lower cost financing for clean energy. Since 2011, for […]
The post How the Connecticut Green Bank is catalyzing green energy infrastructure: An interview with Bryan Garcia, President and CEO, CT Green Bank – Episode #155 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
The Colorado Department of Human Services (CDHS) recently celebrated five years of C-Stat, its performance management and leadership strategy and one of the leading examples in the U.S. of data-informed decision making in human services. Through C-Stat, CDHS reviews about 100 measures each month. Two-thirds of those measures have maintained or beat their goals set in […]
The post Insights from C-Stat in Colorado at year 5: An interview with Reggie Bicha, Executive Director, Colorado Department of Human Services – Episode #154 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
In 2016, the District of Columbia launched The Lab @ DC, based in the Office of the City Administrator within the Office of Mayor Muriel Bowser. Its mission: To embed the scientific method into the heart of day-to-day governance of the city to provide decision makers with high-quality evidence in order to improve results for the city. […]
The post Launching an applied research team within city government: An interview with David Yokum, Director, The Lab @ DC – Interview #153 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
Statistics New Zealand (@Stats_NZ) is the government department of New Zealand charged with collecting and producing statistical information. It is known as a leader in terms of linking data from different data sets in order to enable research and insights into important and complex policy challenges with the goal of improving outcomes for New Zealanders. For over […]
The post How New Zealand links data from public data sets to address important policy challenges: An interview with Kelvin Watson, Deputy Chief Executive, Statistics New Zealand – Episode #152 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
The Department of Human Services (DHS) in Allegheny County, which includes Pittsburgh, is a leader in the use of data to continually improve services for its residents. In 1999, DHS created its Data Warehouse that consolidated its human services data relating to topics such as behavioral health, child welfare and homeless services. It then expanded this database to […]
The post Linking data to improve human services while working within privacy laws: An interview with Erin Dalton and Brian Bell, Allegheny County Department of Human Services – Episode #151 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
What principles can help guide public leaders—whether policymakers or public managers—in their use of evidence-based policy to improve results? Howard White (@HowardNWhite) of the Campbell Collaboration joins us to share four fundamental principles: Use the right evidence to answer the right question. Different types of evidence — e.g., monitoring, process evaluation, impact evaluation and systematic reviews — […]
The post Four fundamental principles of evidence-based policy and practice, drawing from U.S. and European experience: An interview with Howard White, Executive Director, Campbell Collaboration – Episode #150 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
Last month, President Trump issued an executive order calling for agencies to analyze their structures and programs in preparation for a major reorganization. The Trump administration’s focus on reorganization raises the question of when is reorganization useful and what pitfalls need be avoided. To get insights, we’re joined by Bob Behn. Although it is too […]
The post The opportunities and pitfalls of government reorganization: An interview with Bob Behn, Professor, Harvard Kennedy School – Episode #149 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
One of the most innovative new approaches in Federal policy is known as Performance Partnership Pilots, also called P3. In 2014, Congress authorized several Federal agencies, including Education, Labor and HHS, to enter into up to ten Performance Partnership agreements per year with states, regions, localities, or tribal communities. These agreements allow these jurisdictions to […]
The post An overview of Performance Partnership Pilots for Disconnected Youth, with lessons for other areas of social policy: An interview with Thaddeus Ferber, Vice President, Forum for Youth Investment – Episode #148 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
In 2015, a unique collaboration was launched call the Rhode Island Innovative Policy Lab (RIIPL). It is a partnership between researchers at Brown University and the Office of the Governor of Rhode Island, with the goal of helping state agencies design evidence-based policies to better serve Rhode Island families. RIIPL’s goal is to use data […]
The post How the Rhode Island Innovative Policy Lab (RIIPL) works: An interview with Justine Hastings, Director, RIIPL – Episode #147 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
In this podcast episode, we explore two real-life stories from the front lines of government performance improvement efforts that highlight the importance of replication and validation in evidence-based policy. In the U.K., the department of revenue and customs, in conjunction with the U.K. Behavioral Insights Team (BIT), tested new versions of the letter sent to people who were […]
The post The importance of replication and validation in evidence-based policy: An interview with Tammy Chang, U.S. Treasury Department, and Nathaniel Higgins, formerly U.S. Social and Behavioral Sciences Team – Episode #146 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
Massachusetts is known as a leader in providing education policymakers with research findings that they can use to improve policy and practices. The state’s Office of Planning and Research, within the Department of Elementary and Secondary Education (ESE), takes a multifaceted approach: Design a proactive research agenda, also known as a learning agenda Increase internal […]
The post How Massachusetts provides education policymakers with research insights: An interview with Carrie Conaway, Chief Strategy and Research Officer, Massachusetts Department of Elementary and Secondary Education – Episode #145 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
Because many of the most important functions of state and local governments involve contracting for goods and services supplied by the private sector, improving procurement processes is an important way to strengthen outcomes for citizens. That is the motivation behind our series on results-driven contracting. Our focus today is Seattle, Washington, whose Human Services Department […]
The post How Seattle used results-driven contracting to improve homeless services: An interview with Jason Johnson, Deputy Director, Human Services Department, City of Seattle – Episode #144 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
Forty-two states and the District of Columbia spent $6.2 billion in state funds on pre-kindergarten programs in 2015, highlighting the emphasis that policymakers are placing on pre-k to help students prepare for elementary school. Research has shown both the success of pre-K as well as inconclusive evidence about the sustainability of those gains as children […]
The post How states can optimize their pre-K programs: An interview with Greg Duncan, Professor, UC Irvine, and Member, Pre-Kindergarten Task Force – Episode #143 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
The new federal education law, the Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA), emphasizes the importance of evidence, including defining four levels of evidence-based practices. The law, however, leaves it to states to decide how much they want to build an evidence base and how much to nudge districts toward choosing more effective strategies. So what should […]
The post How states can use “efficacy networks” to test strategies for school improvement: An interview with Tom Kane, Professor, Harvard Graduate School of Education – Episode #142 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
“Many of the most important functions of state and local governments – from building and maintaining roads to housing the homeless – involve contracting for goods and services supplied by the private sector,” notes the Harvard Kennedy School’s Government Performance Lab in their primer, Results-Driven Contracting: An Overview. “Unfortunately, governments often treat procurement as a back office administrative […]
The post Transforming the culture of procurement in state and local government: An interview with Jeffrey Liebman, Director, Harvard Kennedy School Government Performance Lab – Episode #141 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
Almost all Federal agencies are lead by a Secretary and a Deputy Secretary. But in 2000, Congress created a new position at the State Department, the Deputy Secretary of State for Management and Resources — in other words, the chief operating officer. In doing so, the Department became the only federal Cabinet-level agency with two co-equal […]
The post Insights from the only Federal department with two Deputy Secretaries: An interview with Heather Higginbottom, former Deputy Secretary for Management and Resources, U.S. Department of State – Episode #140 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
How can Federal agencies successfully streamline their support services, such as HR and IT, to boost efficiency and improve results? We get insights from Jeffrey Neal (@JeffNealHR), a leading expert in human resources issues. He served for 33 years in the Federal government, including as the Chief Human Capital Officer for the 23,000-employee Defense Logistics Agency (DLA) from 2000 to […]
The post Transforming support services in Federal agencies: An interview with Jeffrey Neal, Former Chief Human Capital Officer, Defense Logistics Agency and Department of Homeland Security – Episode #139 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
What is the value of evidence and data for elected city leaders as well as how can those leaders create a results-focused culture within city government? We get insights from Michael Nutter who served for eight years at the Mayor of Philadelphia, from 2008 to January 2016. Under his leadership, Philadelphia became known as a leader in […]
The post Creating a results-focused city government: An interview with Michael Nutter, former Mayor of Philadelphia – Episode #138 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
Public leaders — whether they’re helping run a state agency, a school system, a hospital, a set of Head Start centers or any other organization — are likely to implement changes over time, whether it’s adjusting programs or adding new services. Maybe it’s a new curriculum for students in a school district or new intake procedure for patients in a hospital. Whatever the change, how […]
The post Making rigorous program evaluation easier with RCT-YES software: An interview with Peter Schochet, Fellow, Mathematica Policy Research – Episode #137 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
In 2010, the Administration for Children and Families (ACF) at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services launched a project to explore how programs could advance their goals, and address specific challenges, by applying insights from behavioral sciences, including behavioral economics. It is called the Behavioral Interventions to Advance Self-Sufficiency (BIAS) project. Now, six years later, […]
The post Lessons in applying behavioral insights to human services from the Behavioral Interventions to Advance Self-Sufficiency (BIAS) project: An interview with Lashawn Richburg-Hayes and Nadine Deshausay, MDRC – Episode #136 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
Programs and agencies in government often exist in silos, where the efforts of one aren’t necessarily connected with others and their data are not shared between them. That slows the process within government of learning what works, coordinating efforts, spurring social innovation, and continuous improvement. A growing number of states and localities, however, are developing Integrated […]
The post How states and localities are improving the quality of education, health, and human services through integrated data systems: An interview with Dennis Culhane, Professor, University of Pennsylvania – Episode #135 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
Federal programs produce a lot of data — known as administrative data — and those data can be very useful for program administrators and researchers to answer important questions about policy and practice. That is especially true when data from multiple programs or datasets are linked, producing a broader view of program performance that spans organizational silos. In […]
The post Why broadening access to Federal administrative data is critical for improving government services and increasing taxpayer value: An interview with Maria Cancian, Professor, University of Wisconsin-Madison – Episode #134 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
How can public agencies can use rapid, low-cost experiments to test (and learn from) low-cost, light-touch interventions such as communications and outreach strategies? Also, how can agencies partner with academic researchers to run those experiments and what characteristics of those researcher-practitioner partnerships help make them successful? To get insights into all those topics, we are joined by Adam […]
The post Test, learn and adapt – How public agencies can use researcher-practitioner partnerships to test low-cost, light-touch interventions: An interview with Adam Sacarny, Professor, Columbia University – Episode #133 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
Utah is one of the top states in the U.S. in terms of evidence-based policymaking and budgeting. In particular, with efforts by the Utah State Legislature and the administration of Governor Gary Herbert, Utah has created a variety of agency-specific and cross-agency tools to incorporate evidence into policy and funding decisions. That includes: A requirement from the Governor’s budget office that agencies seeking new […]
The post How Utah became a leader in evidence-based policymaking: An interview with Kristen Cox, Director, Governor’s Office of Planning and Budget, and Jonathan Ball, Director, Utah Fiscal Analysts Office – Episode #132 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
Over the past several years, the State of Mississippi has taken important steps to use evidence in order to get better results from state spending and, in turn, achieve better outcomes for the people of Mississippi. That includes defining tiers of evidence to focus funding on what works; creating comprehensive program inventories that categorize the level of evidence relating […]
The post How the State of Mississippi uses evidence-based budgeting to increase return on investment and improve program outcomes: An interview with Toby Barker, Mississippi State Representative – Episode #131 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
The Education Endowment Foundation (EEF) is dedicated to breaking the link between family income and educational achievement. To do that, it has a unique strategy: increasing the supply of high-quality evidence about what works in order to enable better decisions by teachers and school leaders. Launched in 2011 with a founding grant of £125 million from the […]
The post How the UK’s Education Endowment Foundation (EEF) is building rigorous evidence about how to close education achievement gaps: An interview with Sir Kevan Collins, Chief Executive, EEF – Episode #130 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
If you think about what the Federal government does, grant making may not be the first thing you think of. Even so, billions of dollars flow from the Federal level to states, localities and nonprofits in the form of grants. How can the Federal government encourage more evidence-based policy and innovation through the grant making process? We […]
The post Transforming Federal grant programs from compliance driven to results focused: An interview with Robert Gordon, former Acting Deputy Director, White House Office of Management and Budget – Episode #129 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
An important and underused opportunity for public agencies to improve their results and tackle critical challenges is researcher-practitioner partnerships. When researchers and government executives team up, public agencies can get credible answers to important operational and strategic questions. That can include insights from empirical analyses as well as from field experiments. To get insights into what it takes to […]
The post Creating successful researcher-practitioner partnerships at the Federal level: An interview with Dayanand Manoli, Professor, University of Texas at Austin – Episode #128 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
How can the United States raise job quality and skills for American workers through more effective education and workforce development within states? In particular: How can we fix the misalignment between the skills of Americans without college degrees and the workforce needs of well-paying industries that do not necessarily require a college degree? And how can […]
The post Raising job quality and skills for American workers through more effective education and workforce development within states: An interview with Harry Holzer, Professor, Georgetown University – Episode #127 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
How can communities better address young people’s physical and emotional health needs? A growing trend is the use of school-based health centers. The goal is to provide convenient, accessible, and comprehensive health care services to students from pre-k through high school by having a health provider — or sometimes an interdisciplinary health provider team — […]
The post Using school-based health centers to address the health needs of low-income youth: An interview with Olga Acosta Price, Professor, The George Washington University – Episode #126 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
The Corporation for National and Community Service (CNCS) is probably best known for overseeing the AmeriCorps program. The program provides grants to nonprofits and local governments to address community needs in education, public safety, health and the environment. The money pays to support AmeriCorps members and their activities, whether it’s tutoring in an elementary school or […]
The post How one Federal agency, the Corporation for National and Community Service, strengthened the role of evidence in a key grant program, AmeriCorps: An interview with Diana Epstein and Carla Ganiel, CNCS – Episode #125 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
Bob Behn of the Harvard Kennedy School is one of the leading thinkers on the subjects of public management and leadership. He has argued that public agencies are unlikely to produce better results simply by creating rules, requirements or performance systems. A more effective approach, he notes, is to help managers learn better leadership practices. […]
The post Twelve “better practices” that can help public leaders tackle key organizational challenges and boost results: An interview with Bob Behn, Professor, Harvard Kennedy School – Episode #124 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
When schools or school districts implement district wide reform initiatives, how can they accurately determine if those reform efforts are having the positive effects that school leaders had hoped? How, in other words, can they move beyond anecdotes or simple trend data and rigorously evaluate their district wide reform initiatives? The Wake County Public School System (WCPSS) […]
The post How school districts can use rigorous program evaluation to test new education reforms: An interview with Matthew Lenard, Director, Data Strategy and Analytics, Wake County Public Schools – Episode #123 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
Is my program or initiative having a positive impact? It’s a question about which organizational leaders may want hard evidence, either to take stock and help improve program results, or to satisfy their authorizers or funders who may be asking for rigorous evidence of impact. Either way, how can you determine the impact of your program? And […]
The post Determining if your program is having a positive impact (i.e., impact evaluation 101): An interview with David Evans, Senior Economist, The World Bank – Episode #122 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
Improving schooling outcomes of disadvantaged youth is a top policy priority in the United States, but few interventions have produced convincing evidence that they can improve those outcomes, especially for adolescent youth — the age at which socially costly outcomes occur, such as high school dropout. As a result, it may be conventional wisdom that, by adolescence, […]
The post Using intensive, individualized math tutoring to boost academic outcomes of disadvantaged youth: An interview with Jonathan Guryan, Professor, Northwestern University – Episode #121 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
A Social Impact Bond (SIB) uses private funds – from philanthropy or other investors — to pay for a social, educational, or health programs. Importantly, the government only repays investors, plus a return, if pre-specified results are achieved. A new report by Gordon Berlin, the president of the nonprofit social policy research firm MDRC (@MDRC_News), reflects on the […]
The post Lessons from the nation’s first Social Impact Bond, aimed at reducing recidivism among adolescent offenders at Rikers Island: An interview with Gordon Berlin, President, MDRC – Episode #120 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
Over the last 15 years, the field of education has become considerably more evidence focused, including a growing number of high-quality studies about how to help students succeed in school. An important catalyst has been the Institute of Education Sciences (IES). It is the independent, non-partisan statistics, research, and evaluation arm of the U.S. Department […]
The post How the Institute of Education Sciences at the U.S. Dept. of Education is helping the education field to learn and do what works: An interview with Russ Whitehurst, Senior Fellow, The Brookings Institution – Episode #119 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
Milwaukee’s Teen Pregnancy Prevention Initiative, launched in 2008, is a citywide effort led by the United Way of Greater Milwaukee and Waukesha County. It has been recognized as a model of community collaboration, including by the White House Council for Community Solutions. The three main prongs of the strategy are: An aggressive advertising campaign targeted to teens The use of evidence-based sex education The involvement of […]
The post Milwaukee’s three-pronged strategy to reduce teen pregnancy: An interview with Bevan Baker, Commissioner of Health, City of Milwaukee, and Nicole Angresano, United Way of Greater Milwaukee – Episode #118 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
In program evaluation, using the most rigorous methods possible is essential for producing credible research findings. But beyond the goal of rigor, relevance is important too. In particular, the more that evaluations are able to address specific research or implementation questions that are of interest to practitioners and policymakers, the more likely that the findings […]
The post Three strategies to promote relevance in program evaluations so that findings are useful to policymakers and practitioners: An interview with Evan Weissman, Senior Associate, MDRC – Episode #117 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
Can regular, detailed information sent to parents about their students’ progress lead to improved student achievement? That question was put to the test by in a field experiment in the Los Angeles school system in which parents were given information by text, phone or email about their children’s missing assignments. The results for high school students show surprisingly large […]
The post Improving student outcomes by giving parents detailed information about their child’s academic progress: An interview with Peter Bergman, Professor, Teachers College, Columbia University – Episode #116 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
Today, results-focused cities are using data to improve city services, boost the quality of life, and literally save lives. The City of Las Vegas has gained a reputation for its data-focused approach to addressing important city challenges. A good example is its effort to reduce traffic accidents, first by focusing on reducing left turn crashes and […]
The post Las Vegas’s data-driven effort to improve traffic safety at its most dangerous intersections: An interview with Betsy Fretwell, City Manager, City of Las Vegas – Episode #115 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
The City of New Orleans under Mayor Mitch Landrieu has gained a reputation as being one of the most innovative and data-driven city governments. An important element in those efforts is the Office of Performance and Accountability, launched in 2011. The mission of the office is to use data to set goals, track performance, and drive […]
The post Insights from the City of New Orleans’ analytics unit, NOLAlytics, about using data to improve city services: An interview with Oliver Wise, Director, Office of Performance and Accountability, City of New Orleans – Episode #114 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
In the U.S., more than a third of elderly patients discharged from hospitals are re-admitted within 90 days, often needlessly. An intervention that is helping change that is the nursing-led Transitional Care Model (TCM), pioneered at the University of Pennsylvania. It been the focus of four large scale NIH-funded clinical trials, including three RCTs, all finding […]
The post Improving health outcomes of older adults while reducing costs through the nursing-led Transitional Care Model: An interview with Mary Naylor, Professor, University of Pennsylvania School of Nursing – Episode #113 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
Addressing the nation’s — and the world’s — biggest challenges will require learning and doing what works. A powerful tool for doing that is the randomized evaluation, also known as a randomized control trial (RCT). It is a tool that is increasingly being used in the U.S. and around the world. Well-designed and well-implemented RCTs can […]
The post Using randomized evaluations to address global poverty and other social policy challenges: An interview with Dean Karlan, Professor, Yale University, and President, Innovations for Poverty Action – Episode #112 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
The Meyerhoff Scholars Program at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County (UMBC) is at the forefront of efforts to increase diversity among future leaders in the sciences. It was launched in 1988 to provide financial assistance, mentoring, advising, and research experience to African American undergraduate students committed to obtaining Ph.D. degrees in science, engineering and related […]
The post Increasing diversity in the sciences through the Meyerhoff Scholars Program: An interview with Freeman Hrabowski, President, University of Maryland, Baltimore County – Episode #111 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
Allegheny County, which includes Pittsburgh, is recognized as a leader in using data to improve the results of its human services programs. In particular, the county’s Department of Human Services (DHS) created its Data Warehouse in 1999. The initiative stated by consolidating its own internal human services data relating to topics such as behavioral health, child […]
The post How Allegheny County’s Data Warehouse is improving human services through integrated data: An interview with Erin Dalton, Allegheny County Department of Human Services – Episode #110 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
Michael Nutter served as Mayor of Philadelphia from 2008 to 2016. During his eight years in office, the city became a leader in the use of data, evidence and evaluation to improve outcomes for city residents. In 2014, Governing Magazine named the Mayor one of the Public Officials of the Year, noting, “Philadelphia isn’t an easy place to govern. But Mayor Michael […]
The post How Philadelphia became a leader in the use of data and evidence: An interview with Maia Jachimowicz, V.P. for Evidence-Based Policy, Results for America, and former policy director to Mayor Michael Nutter – Episode #109 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
Can a tax on sugary drinks reduce consumption and therefore fight obesity? The nation of Mexico, which has similarly high rates of obesity as the United States, is putting that question to the test. In 2013, Mexican lawmakers passed an excise tax on sugary drinks of 1 peso (about 8 cents) per liter, which is about a 10 […]
The post The first-year effects of Mexico’s soda tax: An interview with Barry Popkin, Professor, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill School of Public Health – Episode #108 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
How can schools use low-cost solutions to help children make healthier food choices? David Just is an expert on that topic. An economist by training, he is a professor at Cornell University and co-director, with Brian Wansink, of the Cornell Center for Behavioral Economics in Child Nutrition Programs (BEN Center). His research has included dozens of field and lab experiments that identify the subtle […]
The post Using behavioral insights to design smarter school lunchrooms: An interview with David Just, Co-Director, Cornell Center for Behavioral Economics in Child Nutrition Programs – Episode #107 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
Mexico consumes a lot of soda and its soda industry (particularly Coca-Cola) is very powerful. Even so, in 2013, Mexico’s congress was able to successfully pass a nationwide one-peso-per-litre (about 10%) tax on sugary drinks, over the opposition of the soda industry. How did it happen? To gain insights, we’re joined by Tina Rosenberg (@tirosenberg), a Pulitzer Prize winning journalist. Her […]
The post How Mexico took on the soda industry and won, passing a soda tax: An interview with Tina Rosenberg, New York Times and Solutions Journalism Network – Episode #106 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
The Annie E. Casey Foundation, through its juvenile justice initiative, has documented widespread maltreatment of youth in state-funded juvenile corrections facilities, including high rates of sexual victimization and the heavy-handed use of disciplinary isolation. The results include high levels of recidivism and annual costs that often exceed $100,000 per young person. The findings have led […]
The post Calling on states to close their youth prisons: An interview with Patrick McCarthy, President, Annie E. Casey Foundation – Episode #105 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
Increasing the graduation rates at community colleges is an important national challenge. Nationally, less than 40 percent of community college students attain a degree or certificate — and students who come to campus underprepared for college-level work (those needing developmental or remedial classes) have graduation rates below 30 percent. The City University of New York (CUNY) launched […]
The post Doubling community college graduation rates through CUNY’s ASAP program: An interview with Donna Linderman, Dean for Student Success Initiatives, City University of New York – Episode #104 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
To quote social policy expert Isabel Sawhill, “If we want to reduce poverty [in the U.S.], one of the simplest, fastest and cheapest things we could do would be to make sure that as few people as possible become parents before they actually want to.” An important state initiative to do that is Colorado’s Family Planning […]
The post Colorado’s Family Planning Initiative: An interview with Larry Wolk, Executive Director, Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment – Episode #103 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
Can food banks be used to address diet-sensitive disease in low-income communities? A new study of a pilot intervention suggests they can. Between 2012 and 2014, researchers enrolled almost 700 food pantry clients with diabetes in a six-month pilot intervention in three states. The intervention provided participants with diabetes-appropriate food, blood sugar monitoring, primary care referral, and self-management […]
The post Using food banks to fight diabetes and promote health for vulnerable populations: An interview with Dr. Hilary Seligman, Professor, University of California, San Francisco – Episode #102 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
Colorado is a leader among U.S. states in involving state employees in efforts to make state government agencies and programs more efficient and effective through a so-called lean approach. Lean techniques were developed in manufacturing settings, most famously at Toyota, and have since been applied to service settings, including government agencies. Under Governor John Hickenlooper, Colorado launched its lean initiative in 2011 and it has lead to about 200 projects within state agencies and has trained about 2,500 state employees in lean techniques.
To learn more, we are joined by Henry Sobanet, the Director of the Office of State Planning and Budgeting in Colorado, who has spearheaded the state’s lean efforts for Governor Hickenlooper.
Web extra: Henry Sobanet discusses Colorado’s involvement in the Pew-MacArthur Results First Initiative which is working with 19 states and several counties to implement an innovative cost-benefit analysis approach that helps jurisdictions invest in policies and programs that are backed by strong evidence that they work. [click here]
The post Colorado’s lean initiative in state government: An interview with Henry Sobanet, Director of the Office of State Planning and Budgeting, State of Colorado – Episode #101 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
How can the nation catalyze progress on key social policy challenges? A bold proposal, called the Ten Year Challenge, calls for selecting ten important social challenges and then having the federal government fund ten communities or states to address each challenge (so 100 experiments in total), while rigorously evaluating the results. The goal would be to generate a few breakthrough approaches that could be scaled up.
To learn more, we’re joined by the proposal’s author, Jeffrey Liebman, who presented the proposal in a paper published by Results for America and the Hamilton Project at the Brookings Institution. Liebman is a professor at the Harvard Kennedy School, Director of the Taubman Center for State and Local Government, and Director of the Government Performance Lab at the Kennedy School. He previously served on the leadership team of the White House Office of Management and Budget and, prior to that, served as an economic advisor to candidate Barack Obama in the 2008 campaign.
On which challenges could the initiative focus? In the paper, Liebman provides examples, including “reducing recidivism among ex-offenders, raising third-grade reading and math skills among low-income children living in high-poverty neighborhoods, preventing youth from dropping out of high school, helping chronically unemployed individuals obtain and keep jobs, raising community college completion rates, reducing obesity-triggered diabetes, eliminating chronic and/or family homelessness, and helping developmentally-disabled youth make successful transitions into the adult workforce, among many others.”
The post A bold proposal to catalyze progress on key social policy challenges, the Ten Year Challenge: An interview with Jeffrey Liebman, Professor, Harvard Kennedy School – Episode #100 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
There is growing awareness in the U.S. of the problem of bullying in middle and high school. Between a third and a fourth of all students say they have been bullied by other students, whether verbal, physical, and emotional. The potential consequences of bullying and harassment, including violence in schools, has highlighted the need for effective strategies to reduce bullying.
To highlight one evidence-based strategy, we’re joined by Betsy Levy Paluck (@betsylevyp). She is a professor of psychology and public affairs at Princeton University and an expert in the psychology of social norms, social influence, and behavior change. Along with her co-author Hana Shepherd, she ran a unique field experiment that shows that targeting the most influential students in a school can be a key factor in reducing bullying.
The post Reducing bullying in schools through a peer-based strategy: An interview with Betsy Levy Paluck, Professor, Princeton University – Episode #99 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
How can public leaders, whether you’re running a large department or a small program, apply the insights of behavioral economics and other behavioral sciences to improve results? A simplified framework for the application of behavioral insights was developed by the U.K. Behavioral Insights Team (@B_I_Tweets) provides a useful way to start. The framework is called “EAST,” which stands for Easy, Attractive, Social and Timely. As the team notes: “Though we do not claim that EAST is a comprehensive summary of all there is to know about behavioral science, we do think that for busy policymakers, the EAST framework is an accessible, simple way to make more effective and efficient policy.”
To learn more, we’re joined by Simon Ruda who is a director at the Behavioral Insights Team.
The post Applying behavioral insights through the EAST (Easy, Attractive, Social, Timely) framework: An interview with Simon Ruda, UK Behavioral Insights Team – Episode #98 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.
This podcast usually focuses on results-focused government, but our topic today is running a results-focused state think tank — with insights about making change that can be relevant more broadly.
If you’re not from New Mexico, you may not have heard of the nonpartisan nonprofit called Think New Mexico (@ThinkNewMexico). Its record of accomplishment, however, is worth paying attention no matter where you live. With only a four full time staff, plus interns, it has helped bring about a dozen landmark laws over the past 16 years.
To get insights into Think New Mexico’s unique approach, we’re joined by Fred Nathan. He founded Think New Mexico in 1999 and has served as its Executive Director ever since.
Web extra: Fred Nathan discusses Think New Mexico’s current initiative, infrastructure spending reform. [click here]
The post How a small nonprofit in New Mexico achieves big good government wins: An interview with Fred Nathan, Executive Director, Think New Mexico – Episode #97 appeared first on Gov Innovator podcast.