Hearing on the Government Performance and Results
Act
Testimony of
Dr. Joseph Bordogna, Acting Deputy Director
National Science Foundation
Before the House Science Committee
July 30, 1997
Mr. Chairman, Representative Brown, members of the
Committee, it is a great pleasure for me to join you
today to discuss the National Science Foundation's
approach to the Government Performance and Results
Act. As you know, this hearing comes at a crucial
time in the implementation of the Results Act. Many
of the most important milestones spelled out in the
act are fast approaching. Full implementation of the
GPRA in fact begins with the development of agency
budget requests for FY 1999.
NSF has always viewed implementation of GPRA as an
opportunity to strengthen our strategic planning process
and link it to budget formulation. As many have noted,
this opportunity has proven to be a challenging one,
but we have found that the Results Act provides a
valuable tool for shaping our programs and continuing
to improve the already high returns on public investments
in science and engineering research and education.
NSF began addressing the performance and accountability
issues raised by GPRA in 1994, and this work has already
led to a number of important changes in our general
approach to budgeting and priority setting.
- First, instead of viewing our budget as dollars
spread out over seven directorates and scores
of program offices and divisions, we are now approaching
it as a portfolio of investments in four key program
functions that work to achieve specific outcomes.
- Second, we have recognized that the integrative
nature of NSF's investments in research and education
sets us apart from other agencies with research
and development missions. While several agencies
support research and/or education, NSF alone supports
both across all of science and engineering and
at all levels of education.
- Third, we have refined our approach to better
gauge the effectiveness of both our programs and
our internal processes. Put simply, we are seeking
to ensure that our investments represent both
"money well spent" and "money spent well."
We are now approaching the conclusion of what could
be called "preseason" in terms of the GPRA process.
We have learned from pilot projects, tested different
approaches, and continuously refined the various planning
documents required by the Results Act. The comments
we expect to receive in coming days from the Congress
and other stakeholders will allow us to apply finishing
touches to our draft strategic plan. We will then
turn our attention in full to developing the performance
plan that will accompany our FY 1999 budget.
As often occurs during any type of preseason, the
most valuable lesson we learned was the importance
of staying focused on "the fundamentals." For NSF,
this has meant clarifying the linkage between our
statutory mission and the outcomes generated by our
investment decisions.
The NSF Act of 1950 (as amended) establishes the Foundation's
mission - "to promote the progress of science" - and
sets forth the agency's role in supporting science
and engineering research as well as education at all
levels in science, mathematics, engineering, and technology.
The outcomes identified in our planning documents
represent tangible realizations of this broad mission:
- Discoveries at and across the frontier of science
and engineering.
- Vital connections between discoveries and their
use in service to society.
- A diverse, productive, globally-oriented workforce
of scientists and engineers.
- Improved achievement in the essential mathematics
and science skills needed by all Americans.
These four outcomes now guide the development of NSF's
investment priorities. For example, NSF's commitment
to raising achievement in mathematics and science
is borne out by our investments in systemic reform:
we now support 59 systemic initiatives in 38 states
that reach 56,000 teachers serving 7.7 million students
in nearly 13,000 schools. Similarly, to enable discovery,
we are bringing a number of path-breaking facilities
on-line over the next five years. One highlight among
these investments is LIGO - The Laser Interferometer
Gravitational Wave Observatory. Gravitational waves
have eluded detection since they were first predicted
by Albert Einstein, and their discovery would open
a new window on the universe that would advance research
and education across all of science and engineering.
The most informative - and the most challenging -
component of the Results Act framework will likely
be gauging progress toward our four outcomes goals.
As the GAO's March 1997 report, Measuring Performance:
Strengths and Limitations of Research Indicators,
stressed, "the very nature of the innovative process
makes measuring the performance of science-related
projects difficult."
For this reason, NSF intends to employ a variety of
mechanisms to assess program performance. Certain
activities lend themselves readily to close monitoring
of observable indicators and milestones. Investments
in high speed networking are one such example: we
can track key parameters like networking speeds, connections,
and reliability, and we can also review the scientific
gains resulting from these enhanced capabilities (i.e.
increased reliability in weather forecasting models
or improved resolution in real-time medical imaging
systems).
The majority of NSF's resources, however, support
individual investigator and small group activities
that require more qualitative approaches to assessment
and evaluation. For these types of activities, we
expect to employ an approach that focuses on both
results and process: experts and stakeholders will
conduct retrospective assessments of program results,
and we will also conduct prospective reviews of our
resource allocation processes. This dual process/results
approach will allow us to demonstrate and document
the return on NSF's total investment portfolio - without
sending onerous signals that would likely stifle creativity
and innovation in the research and education community.
Key data for these evaluations will come directly
from the researchers and educators engaged in NSF-supported
activities. We are consolidating several existing
reports and establishing an automated information
gathering process for grantees (via the Fastlane system).
The research and education community has provided
especially valuable guidance on this matter, as it
was a primary focal point for comments at both of
the public meetings we held earlier this month.
These comments reinforced our determination to address
the potential for burdensome and possibly duplicative
reporting requirements across the different Federal
agencies that support research and education. The
National Science and Technology Council has discussed
this issue, and we expect coordination of measures
among Federal agencies will be addressed as implementation
of the Results Act continues.
In closing, we recognize that the conclusion of this
preliminary stage of the process does not mean the
end of practice and experimentation. We are all new
to the Results Act framework, and the steepest parts
of the learning curve may yet lie ahead of us. Meeting
the challenges presented by the Results Act will undoubtedly
require continued experimentation with different approaches.
We fully expect -- indeed we hope -- that this remains
a collaborative process. The insights and guidance
provided to date by this committee and other Congressional
bodies have greatly improved both the structure and
the substance of our GPRA plan. We look forward to
continuing this productive exchange of ideas as we
collectively work through this first season of governance
under the Results Act.
See also: Hearing Summary.
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