Apply a two-question filter to every program: does it move one of your board-adopted goals, and is there evidence it actually works? Programs that can answer yes to both deserve continued investment. Programs that can't should carry a heavy burden of justification before the next budget cycle funds them again. Your board's role is not to evaluate each program individually — that's management work. Your role is to establish this standard and hold your superintendent to it.
This sounds simple. Applying it consistently is harder — because most districts have accumulated programs over decades without ever asking these questions, and many of those programs have constituencies that will push back hard when scrutiny arrives.
The two-question filter
The first question — does this program move a board goal? — requires that the connection be specific, not general. "This program supports student success" isn't an answer. "This program advances our goal of 80% third-grade reading proficiency by providing small-group intervention to students reading below grade level in grades K through 2" is an answer. If the program team can't make that specific connection, the program isn't aligned to your strategy.
The second question — is there evidence it works? — doesn't require a randomized controlled trial. It does require something: outcome data from your own district, research on similar programs in comparable settings, or a credible theory of action with defined data checkpoints. "We believe in this program" is not evidence. "Students in this program improved reading scores by X points compared to a matched comparison group" is evidence.
What to do with programs that can't answer yes
Failing the filter doesn't mean automatic elimination. Some programs exist for legally mandated reasons, or are funded by grants with restricted purposes, or serve community functions your board has explicitly valued through a guardrail. Those are legitimate exceptions — but they should be named as exceptions, not treated as invisible.
For programs with no mandate, no restricted funding, and no connection to a goal or demonstrated results, the questions are:
- Is this program new enough that you're still gathering evidence? If so, set a timeline and criteria for a decision.
- Is this program surviving because eliminating it is politically difficult? That's a reason to have a harder conversation, not a reason to continue funding.
- Who owns the decision to continue or discontinue? That should be your superintendent, informed by your board's standard.
How seniority and political attachment distort funding
The most common reason programs survive without evidence isn't that the evidence is missing — it's that no one is required to produce it. Programs that have been around for fifteen years carry implicit legitimacy. Programs championed by popular staff members, active parent groups, or board members with personal connections acquire political protection. Neither seniority nor political attachment is evidence of effectiveness.
This distortion is structural, not individual. It doesn't require bad actors — only the absence of a clear standard. When "we fund what moves our goals and has evidence of working" isn't the explicit governing rule, funding decisions default to relationship and habit. Establishing the standard is what changes the system.
Building a program inventory
One practical ask: request an annual program inventory that includes, for each significant program:
- Which board goal the program is designed to advance
- Annual cost, number of students served, and cost per student
- Outcome data from the most recent year available
- Your superintendent's recommendation: continue, modify, or discontinue
Even a rough inventory creates visibility that didn't exist before. Programs that have never been asked to justify themselves suddenly have to. Equally important: ask your superintendent to identify what the district is recommending for abandonment. A program inventory that shows only continuations and additions — nothing being stopped — hasn't applied the filter honestly.
Practical steps
- At a fall board work session before any budget drafting begins, formally adopt the two-question standard — goal alignment and evidence of effectiveness — as the criteria your board will apply. Having this on record before any specific program is under pressure keeps it from looking like a pretext when you use it.
- Ask your superintendent to present an annual program inventory at the start of each budget cycle. Include the four fields above for each significant program and require a superintendent recommendation for each entry.
- Require that the inventory include an explicit abandonment list — programs the superintendent recommends discontinuing or significantly reducing. If nothing appears on that list, ask why before accepting the inventory.
- When a board member advocates for a specific program during budget review, redirect to the standard: does it move a goal, and is there evidence it works? That test applies to programs members want to protect just as much as programs they want to cut.
- Set a review timeline for any program that fails the filter but isn't being discontinued — a date by which outcome data must be available and a decision will be made. Programs shouldn't survive indefinitely on the promise of future evidence.