Last year, schools across the United States spent $981.57 billion on education. The scale of this investment reflects not only the work of educators and administrators, but also the combined efforts of policymakers at the local, state, and federal levels. By systematically studying programs from implementation to outcome, evaluators provide evidence about what is working, what is not, and how programs can be improved.

In 2025, many minority-serving higher education institutions (MSIs) found themselves navigating canceled federal grants and making rapid, consequential decisions—sometimes within weeks—about whether to scale back, pause, redesign, or absorb activities originally planned as grant-funded. Looking across these experiences, several operational lessons stand out.