On the Evidence
On the Evidence
MATHEMATICA
A podcast hosted by Mathematica’s J.B. Wogan that examines what we know about today’s most urgent challenges and how we can make progress in addressing them. Reimagining the way the world gathers and uses data, Mathematica uncovers the evidence that offers our partners the confidence and clarity they need to find out what can be done, how to make it happen, and where to go next.
106 | Jennifer Pahlka on Government in the Digital Age
Jennifer Pahlka served as the U.S. deputy chief technology officer under President Barack Obama and founded Code for America, a nonprofit that works to improve government digital services. In her new book, "Recoding America: Why Government is Failing in the Digital Age and How We Can Do Better," Pahlka takes us beyond the basics to explore why policy implementation goes wrong and what we can do to improve delivery of government services and create better outcomes for the American public. On this episode of On the Evidence, Pahlka and Mathematica's Mike Burns discuss "Recoding America," the nexus of evidence-based policy and delivery-driven policy, and how we can close the gap between policy intentions and real-world outcomes. A full transcript of this episode is available here: https://www.mathematica.org/blogs/jennifer-pahlka-on-government-in-the-digital-age Learn more about Pahlka's book, "Recoding America: Why Government is Failing in the Digital Age and How We Can Do Better": https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781250266774/recodingamerica Read Pahlka’s June 2023 op-ed in The Washington Post, “Better government tech starts with people. New Jersey shows how.”: https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2023/06/13/new-jersey-digital-unemployment-insurance/ Read Pahlka’s bio: https://www.recodingamerica.us/
Oct 26, 2023
36 min
105 | How Colorado Committed to Supporting Teacher Diversity and Why it Matters to Students
Teacher recruitment and retention challenges have increased since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic. But even before that, students of diverse backgrounds have historically not seen themselves reflected in the adults in their classrooms and schools. Why does this matter? Students of color do better in school when they have teachers who share similar identities. For example, Black students with at least one Black teacher in grades K-3 are 13 percent more likely to graduate high school and 19 percent more likely to enroll in college than their same-race same-school peers. And all students benefit from diversity of the teacher workforce: teachers of color are positive role models for all students in breaking down negative stereotypes and preparing students to live and work in a multiracial society. This episode focuses on efforts to diversify the teacher workforce and provide supports to teachers from diverse backgrounds in schools. The guests for this episode are Colorado State Representative Jennifer Bacon; Janet Damon, a teacher at Delta High School, in Denver, Colorado; and Steven Malick, a senior researcher at Mathematica. Colorado State Representative Jennifer Bacon is Assistant Majority Leader and represents House District 7, which includes the Denver International Airport and Denver’s far northeast neighborhoods. Representative Bacon serves as Vice Chair of the House Judiciary Committee and a member of the House Education Committee. Representative Bacon is also the Chair of the Black Democratic Legislative Caucus of Colorado. Janet Rene Damon, Ed.S has spent 24 years as a high school teacher, digital librarian, and literacy engagement activist. She is co-founder of Afros and Books, a citywide literacy and nature engagement that offers culturally sustaining programming and book clubs for families in Denver. Janet was awarded the Inaugural Making our Futures Brighter Award from the Black Family Advisory Council in 2022, the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Humanitarian Award in 2022, and the Library Journal Mover and Shaker Award in 2020. Steven Malick of Mathematica focuses on bridging the gap between research and practice in the K–12 education system. He specializes in working with districts, states, and other organizations to understand and apply evidence in service of improving educator effectiveness and student achievement. His work has helped clients increase the diversity of the teacher workforce, develop social-emotional competencies in children, and accelerate implementation of research-based strategies. A full transcript of this episode is available here: https://www.mathematica.org/blogs/how-colorado-committed-to-supporting-teacher-diversity-and-why-it-matters-to-students Watch a webinar from REL Central at Mathematica on research and promising practices to support a diverse teacher workforce: https://ies.ed.gov/ncee/rel/Products/Region/central/Resource/107037
Oct 11, 2023
51 min
104 | Michael Mann on Taking Action to Address the Climate Crisis
For anyone looking to understand Earth’s climate history and the unfolding climate crisis, Michael Mann has got you covered. Mann is the Presidential Distinguished Professor in the Department of Earth and Environmental Science at the University of Pennsylvania and director of the Penn Center for Science, Sustainability, and the Media. He has authored numerous books, including The New Climate War and The Hockey Stick and the Climate Wars. He was selected by Scientific American as one of the fifty leading visionaries in science and technology in 2002 and was elected to the U.S. National Academy of Sciences in 2020. “Climate doomism” – the idea that it’s too late to act on the climate crisis – is a common refrain that promotes inaction. But in his new book, Our Fragile Moment: How Lessons from Earth's Past Can Help Us Survive the Climate Crisis, Mann argues that we can avoid catastrophe if we take meaningful action to address the crisis. On this episode, Mike Burns, Mathematica senior director of communications and public affairs, speaks with Mann about his new book and preserving “our fragile moment.” Topics addressed include: • Lessons that can–and cannot–be drawn from Earth’s climate history • Why seemingly insignificant temperature changes aren’t so insignificant • The concepts of urgency and agency, and obstacles to climate action • “Shifting baseline syndrome” – the gradual change in expected norms for environmental conditions • Weighing the paleoclimate record with other sources of information about the climate system • Effective communication and messaging strategies around climate science and climate change A full transcript of this episode is available here: https://www.mathematica.org/blogs/climate-scientist-michael-mann-on-preserving-our-fragile-moment Learn more about Mann’s new book, Our Fragile Moment: How Lessons from Earth's Past Can Help Us Survive the Climate Crisis: https://www.hachettebookgroup.com/titles/michael-e-mann/our-fragile-moment/9781541702899/?lens=publicaffairs Read Mann’s full bio: https://michaelmann.net/content/about
Sep 27, 2023
25 min
103 | OMB Evidence Team on Evidence-Based Policymaking and Federal Evaluation
From helping lead implementation of the Evidence Act to providing technical assistance on activities and initiatives, the Evidence Team at the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) is on the frontlines of evidence building and use across the federal government. Led by Diana Epstein (Team Lead), Erica Zielewski (Senior Evidence Analyst), Danielle Berman (Senior Evidence Analyst), and Erika Liliedahl (Senior Evidence Analyst), the OMB Evidence Team spends their days doing “anything and everything to help make sure that government uses the best possible evidence to make decisions.” On this episode of Mathematica’s On the Evidence podcast—I speak with Diana, Erica, and Danielle to better understand Evidence Act implementation and federal evaluation, and the role the Evidence Team plays in efforts to improve government-wide effectiveness. Among several topics, the episode covers: • Successes and challenges of the Evidence Act • Evidence Act Title I and OMB’s Evidence Act implementing guidance • The Evidence Team’s role in interagency collaboration • The ongoing culture change around evidence-based decision-making • The Evaluation Officer Council A full transcript of this episode is available here: https://www.mathematica.org/blogs/the-omb-evidence-team-on-evidence-based-policymaking-and-federal-evaluation Learn more about the OMB Evidence Team: https://www.evaluation.gov/about/ Read a fact sheet from the Bipartisan Policy Center on the Evidence Act: https://bipartisanpolicy.org/blog/fact-sheet-foundations-for-evidence-based-policymaking-act/ Read OMB’s Evidence Act implementing guidance: https://www.evaluation.gov/2021-09-27-OMB-M-21-27-guidance/ Learn more about the Evaluation Office Council: https://www.evaluation.gov/about-evaluation-officers/
Sep 19, 2023
39 min
102 | Gayle Smith on the Federal Role in Global Response to Health and Climate Crises
Gayle Smith, CEO of the ONE Campaign, served in many leadership roles in the federal government as a staunch advocate for evidence-based decision making. As Coordinator for Global COVID Response and Health Security at the U.S. Department of State in 2021, Smith led the U.S. effort to end the global pandemic, helping the Biden-Harris Administration map out a response, identify spikes, and target vulnerabilities through monitoring, testing, diagnostics, and other tools. As Administrator of the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) during the Obama Administration, Smith prioritized a culture of evaluation and learning, emphasizing the importance of focusing on outcomes rather than inputs and using data and evidence to make midcourse corrections on projects and programs. And, as a White House official who played a leading role in the U.S. response to Ebola, Smith saw firsthand the importance of leveraging data to track outbreaks, target treatments, invest resources, and move in real time to maximize impact. On this episode of Mathematica’s On the Evidence podcast—one in our occasional Evidence in Government series—Mike Burns, Mathematica senior director of communications and public affairs, spoke with Smith about a range of topics including evaluation at USAID, the U.S. response to Ebola, the intersection of development finance and climate change, the U.S. President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR), bilateral and global agencies, and the COVID-19 global health crisis, including its economic impact on women. A full transcript of this episode is available here: https://www.mathematica.org/blogs/gayle-smith-on-the-federal-role-in-global-response-to-health-and-climate-crises Read Smith’s remarks from the 2016 Brookings Institution event on the state of evaluation at USAID: https://www.brookings.edu/wp-content/uploads/2016/03/20160330_usaid_evaluation_transcript.pdf Read the ONE Campaign’s statement on the appointment of Ajay Banga as president of the World Bank: https://www.one.org/us/press/banga-world-bank/ Read ONE’s statement on the 20th anniversary of the PEPFAR announcement: https://www.one.org/us/press/one-statement-on-20th-anniversary-of-pepfar-announcement/ Read Smith’s POLITICO interview with Ambassador Linda Thomas-Greenfield: https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2022/11/01/linda-thomas-greenfield-gayle-smith-interview-00014844
Aug 30, 2023
21 min
101 | Using Data to Advance Equitable Outcomes from Pre-K through the Workforce
The COVID-19 pandemic exacerbated pre-existing inequities that changed how individuals engage with pre-K programs, schools, colleges, employers, and the world at large. Early evidence suggests the pandemic took a toll on student learning, educational attainment, employment, and physical and mental well-being, especially in communities of color and communities experiencing poverty. In recognition of the fact that better data infrastructure will be needed to shift the systems that currently produce inequitable outcomes, a growing number of states are working to modernize statewide longitudinal data systems to understand the experiences and outcomes of individuals seamlessly across pre-K, K–12, postsecondary, and workforce systems. This episode of On the Evidence focuses on efforts to advance equitable outcomes from cradle to career by making data more available and useful to state decision makers. The guests for this episode are Keith White of the Public Education Foundation Chattanooga, Naihobe Gonzalez of Mathematica, Sara Kerr of Results for America, and Ross Tilchin of Results for America. White is the director of research and effectiveness at the PEF Chattanooga, a non-profit that provides training, research, and resources to teachers, principals, and schools in Hamilton County, Tennessee. Gonzalez, a senior researcher at Mathematica, co-authored a recent report funded by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation on the Education-to-Workforce Indicator Framework, which establishes a common set of metrics and data equity principles for assessing and addressing disparities along the pre-K-to-workforce continuum. Kerr is the vice president of education policy implementation for Results for America, where she leads EdResearch for Action, an initiative that fosters a more nuanced and effective application of evidence-based strategies by improving the quality, availability, and use of evidence in education. Tilchin is on the solutions team at Results for America, where he directs the Economic Mobility Catalog, an online resource that helps local government leaders identify and implement evidence-based strategies, from early childhood education to workforce development, that can advance economic mobility in their communities. A full transcript of this episode is available here: https://www.mathematica.org/blogs/advancing-equitable-outcomes-from-pre-k-through-the-workforce-by-aligning-state-local-data-systems Explore the Education-to-Workforce Indicator Framework: https://www.educationtoworkforce.org/ Learn more about the Economic Mobility Catalog from Results for America: https://catalog.results4america.org/ Learn more about EdResearch for Action from Results for America and the Annenberg Institute at Brown University: https://edresearchforaction.org/ Watch a webinar with Mathematica, Mirror Group, and the Data Quality Campaign about increasing collaboration and alignment across local, state, and national data systems to help address disparities along the pre-K-to-workforce continuum: https://www.mathematica.org/events/opportunity-for-all
Aug 16, 2023
56 min
Bonus Content | J.B. Wogan Reflects on 100 Episodes
In this special feature, On the Evidence host J.B. Wogan reflects on the first 100 episodes of the Mathematica podcast, and retraces some of the steps taken in the almost five years since the series launched in early 2019. Learn more, listen, and subscribe: https://mathematica.org/ontheevidence
Aug 4, 2023
39 min
100 | Robert Shea on the Federal Government’s Progress in Using Evidence
In May 2023, Mathematica hosted a convening on Capitol Hill about embedding evidence in federal decision making, with a focus on the legacy of the nearly five-year-old Foundations for Evidence-Based Policymaking Act, also known as the Evidence Act. One of the attendees that day was Robert Shea, an expert on performance improvement in government who served on the bipartisan U.S. Commission on Evidence-Based Policymaking, a group whose recommendations informed the Evidence Act. Shea is the chief executive officer for GovNavigators, a government management consulting firm, where he hosts a podcast called The GovNavigators Show. His career has also included posts at the White House Office of Management and Budget, the Senate Committee on Governmental Affairs, and the House Committee on Government Reform and Oversight. On this episode of Mathematica’s On the Evidence podcast, Shea discusses the improvements he has witnessed since the mid-1990s in the use of data and evidence in federal decision making. “We have seen a sea change in the ability of agencies to understand that they need to articulate what they’re trying to accomplish in terms of outcomes, report that transparently,” Shea says on the episode. “A lot of what we’re talking about today is sort of dig deeper—find out whether it’s what we’re doing that’s contributing to the ultimate outcome rather than some other factor.” This episode is part of an occasional series on the show called Evidence in Government, which explores new developments in the halls of government and the role that evidence can play in decisions that could improve people’s lives. Mike Burns, Mathematica’s senior director of communications and public affairs at Mathematica, conducts the Evidence in Government interviews. SHOW NOTES Listen to The GovNavigators Show, a podcast Shea hosts with Adam Hughes about government management: https://www.govnavigators.com/podcast Watch a recording of the event Mathematica hosted in May 2023 on the Evidence Act: https://www.mathematica.org/events/evidence-at-work-for-the-american-people Learn more about the U.S. Commission on Evidence-Based Policymaking, which made recommendations ahead of the Foundations for Evidence-Based Policymaking Act of 2018: https://obamawhitehouse.archives.gov/omb/management/commission_evidence Read a fact sheet from the Bipartisan Policy Center on the Foundations for Evidence-Based Policymaking Act: https://bipartisanpolicy.org/blog/fact-sheet-foundations-for-evidence-based-policymaking-act/ Read a press release about the resolution to establish a new commission on evidence-based policymaking: https://kilmer.house.gov/media/press-releases/kilmer-spearheads-legislative-change-with-introduction-of-evidence-based-policymaking-resolution Read the bipartisan resolution to establish a new commission on evidence-based policymaking to further embed the use of data and evidence in federal decision making: https://www.congress.gov/bill/118th-congress/house-concurrent-resolution/49/text?s=1&r=1&q=%7B%22search%22%3A%5B%22Evidence+commission%22%5D%7D
Aug 2, 2023
27 min
99 | Understanding Why More Eligible Kids Got Free Meals During Pandemic Summers
Leading up to the COVID-19 pandemic, only about one in every seven students served by the National School Lunch Program also participated in free summer meals programs provided by the federal Food and Nutrition Service. The low ratio of students accessing meals in the summer compared to the school year has been dubbed the “summer food gap.” Policymakers and anti-hunger advocates have long worried that millions of children from households with low incomes aren’t getting enough to eat when school is out of session, posing risks to children’s health, learning, and overall well-being. This episode of On the Evidence examines what happened during the COVID-19 pandemic when the federal government temporarily waived some of its program rules, giving meal providers much more flexibility in how they fed students during the school year and in the summer months. With the waivers in place, program operators could prioritize convenience for families and avoid the spread of infection. For example, parents or guardians could pick up meals for their children at the curb or a drive-through; they could grab more than one meal at a time; and they could pick up the meals outside of traditional service hours, such as in the early mornings or evenings. The waivers also cleared the way for more summer meals sites to open, which helped establish new sites closer to where some families lived. Recent research from the Food and Nutrition Service and Mathematica shows that in 2020, with temporary program waivers in place because of the pandemic, these federal summer meals programs reached many more children and served many more meals than usual. The podcast examines why access to meals improved in the summer of 2020 and what it could mean for summer meal access now that COVID-19 is no longer a public health emergency, and those temporary waivers have ended. The episode features three guests: Shana Christrup, Lindsay Aguilar, and Veronica Severn. Christrup is the public health director for the Bipartisan Policy Center, which released a report in January 2022 that recommended changes to federal child nutrition programs, including changes that would expand access to meals in the summer. Aguilar is the food services director for the Tucson Unified School District. Severn is a survey researcher at Mathematica who coauthored the recent report on the pandemic-era waivers for child nutrition programs in the spring and summer of 2020. Read the report from the Food and Nutrition Service and Mathematica on child nutrition program operations from March through September 2020: https://smo-study.mathematica.org/ Read the report from the Bipartisan Policy Center on strengthening child nutrition programs: https://bipartisanpolicy.org/report/child-nutrition-programs/ Read Route Fifty’s story on lessons from the pandemic about feeding more children during the summer: https://www.route-fifty.com/health-human-services/2023/06/federal-covid-changes-helped-feed-twice-many-kids-during-summer/387158/
Jul 20, 2023
39 min
98 | Developing Education Programs to Prevent Violence and Crime in Latin America and the Caribbean
This episode of Mathematica’s On the Evidence podcast focuses on how research informs funding strategies to tackle an urgent social challenge. A couple of years ago, Mathematica reviewed evidence from across the world on whether education programs can prevent or mitigate violence and crime. USAID commissioned the report to help develop effective strategies for leveraging the education sector to address violence and crime in Latin America and the Caribbean. Although Mathematica’s researchers identified almost two dozen promising programs in the review, they also noted the need for further research. For example, few of the studies show causal impacts or provide evidence from an effective program in Latin America or the Caribbean. To build on findings from Mathematica’s evidence review, USAID and the International Rescue Committee(IRC) partnered to launch an initiative called USAID Research in Education for Transformative Opportunities (RETO), which provides tailored evidence to decision makers in governmental and non-governmental institutions, such as local ministries of education. The initiative seeks to help those education leaders implement effective programs and policies in Northern Central America that will reduce local violence and crime. The guests for this episode are Juan Carlos Rodríguez, Katie Appel, Melissa Chiappetta, and Emilie Bagby. Rodríguez and Appel are the director and deputy director, respectively, for USAID's RETO activity implemented by the IRC and its 12 national partners. Chiappetta is a senior education advisor with the Office of Regional Sustainable Development within USAID's Bureau for Latin America and the Caribbean. Bagby is a director at Mathematica, where she oversees our international education research. Find the full transcript here: mathematica.org/blogs/developing-education-programs-to-prevent-violence-and-crime-in-latin-america-and-the-caribbean Read the evidence review by Mathematica for USAID on the effect of education programs on violence, crime, and related outcomes: https://pdf.usaid.gov/pdf_docs/PA00XGXT.pdf Learn more about RETO: https://www.youthpower.org/usaid-research-education-transformative-opportunities-reto Learn more about IRC’s Airbel Impact Lab: https://airbel.rescue.org/?_ga=2.189623531.1744177215.1687884026-800337516.1664199528 Learn more about Mathematica’s evaluations for USAID’s Latin America and the Caribbean Reads (LAC Reads) initiative, which included the evidence review on education programs to prevent or mitigate violence and crime: https://staginginter.mathematica.net/projects/latin-america-and-the-caribbean-reading-evaluation
Jul 6, 2023
42 min
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