Program Evaluation: A Variety of Rigorous Methods Can Help Identify Effective Interventions

Some recent congressional initiatives seek to focus federal funds on interventions that have been found effective in randomized experiments. GAO was asked to examine the process used by the nonprofit Coalition for Evidence-Based Policy to identify interventions meeting such an evidence standard, as well as the types of interventions best suited to that method. GAO compared the Coalition's process to that used by six
federally supported efforts to identify effective interventions. The report addresses the conditions under which randomized experiments are or are not well-suited for assessing effectiveness, and describes several rigorous alternative methods. GAO concludes that requiring evidence from randomized studies will likely exclude many potentially effective practices and notes the role of other considerations in the
decision to adopt an intervention.

Read the report online at: http://www.gao.gov/Products/GAO-10-30