	Billions of Federal Education Dollars Distributed Through Hundreds of Programs and Multiple Agencies

Overall federal support for education includes not only federal funds, but also nonfederal funds associated with federal legislation. The remaining 15 percent is spent by more than 30 additional departments or agencies. 5.) Thirteen federal departments and agencies administered these programs and received about $2.3 billion. Kinds of Information Needed

To efficiently and effectively operate, manage, and oversee programs and activities, agencies need reliable, timely program performance and cost information and the analytic capacity to use that information. nationwide. Finally, the Congress needs the ability to look across all programs designed to help a given target group to assess how the programs are working together and whether the overall federal effort is accomplishing a mission such as preventing substance abuse among youths. The Department of Education also has contracts for evaluating what works. Challenges in Obtaining Important Information

If (1) process information is critical for program, agency, and interagency management of federal elementary and secondary programs, and (2) outcome and impact information is needed to assess results and focus efforts on what works, why is information not readily available? The challenges to collecting that information include competing priorities—such as reducing paperwork and regulatory burden and promoting flexibility in program implementation—that restrict data collection and evaluation activities; the cost of data collection; the secondary role of education in many programs; the difficulty of obtaining impact evaluation information (under any circumstances); the special challenge to assessing overall effects on federal efforts involving multiple federal programs in multiple agencies; and until recently, a lack of focus on results and accountability. If agencies and OMB use the annual planning process to highlight crosscutting program issues, the individual agency performance plans and the governmentwide performance plan should provide the Congress with the information needed to identify agencies and programs addressing similar missions. The Government Performance and Results Act: 1997 Governmentwide Implementation Will Be Uneven (GAO/GGD-97-109, June 2, 1997).
Why GAO Did This Study

GAO discussed: (1) the amount and complexity of federal support for education; (2) additional planning, implementation, and evaluative information needed by agencies and the Congress on federal education programs; and (3) some of the challenges of obtaining more and better information.

What GAO Found

GAO noted that: (1) billions in federal education dollars are distributed through hundreds of programs and more than 30 agencies; (2) agencies and the Congress need information to plan, implement, and evaluate these programs; (3) to gauge and ensure the success of these programs, the Congress and agencies need several kinds of information; (4) they need to know which specific program approaches or models are most effective, the circumstances in which they are effective, and if the individual programs are working nationwide; (5) they also need to be able to look across all programs that are designed to help a given target group to see if individual programs are working efficiently together and whether the federal effort is working effectively overall; (6) GAO believes a close examination of these multiple education programs is needed; (7) the current situation has created the potential for inefficient service and reduced overall effectiveness; (8) basic information about programs and program results is lacking and there are many challenges in obtaining this important information; and (9) the Government Performance and Results Act of 1993 (GPRA) holds promise as a tool to help agencies manage for results, coordinate their efforts with other agencies, and obtain the information they need to plan and implement programs and evaluate program results.