April 6, 2000
Richard W. Riley
Secretary of Education
Department of Education
400 Maryland Ave., SW
Washington, DC 20202
Dear Secretary Riley:
As you know, Congress is focused on ensuring
that the government effectively and efficiently manages its
information technology (IT) resources. The Clinger-Cohen Act of
1996 was enacted, in part, in response to concerns about how the
federal government was acquiring IT. The Act mandates that,
among other things, executive agencies design and implement
processes for IT capital planning and investment control,
implement specified IT-related actions to enhance performance
and results-based management, and establish Chief Information
Officers with certain defined duties and responsibilities. In
addition, the Act requires the agencies to identify IT
acquisition programs that have significantly deviated from their
cost, performance, or schedule goals. The Act also requires the
agencies to use, to the maximum extent practicable, modular
contracting for major IT system acquisitions.
The Senate Committee on Governmental Affairs
played a large role in the passage of the Clinger-Cohen Act, and
we maintain a high level of interest in compliance with its
provisions. As part of our oversight agenda, we have developed a
series of questions to ascertain the status of Clinger-Cohen Act
compliance in the agencies and departments subject to its
mandates. Your response to these questions will serve as the
basis for our further oversight on information technology
management issues.
As you prepare your responses to the following
questions, we ask that you provide sufficient documentation and
examples to support the answers you are providing to the
Committee.
Effectively Using Agency Chief Information
Officers
1. Please provide the name and official title of
the individual currently serving as Chief Information
Officer (CIO). If the individual is serving in an
"acting" capacity, please explain the steps you are
taking to finalize an appointment to this position.
(a) Since CCA enactment in February 1996,
how many individuals have served in the CIO position for
Department of Education, and what were the periods of their
service?
(b) Does the CIO have a direct reporting
relationship to you? If not, to whom does the CIO directly
report on a day-to-day basis?
(c) Is the CIO a member of formal
executive-level strategic planning, budget, and program-area
process re-design committees, groups, or councils
established in Department of Education? (1) What are the
responsibilities of the CIO on these committees and groups?
(2) Has the CIO made, or played a vital role in making,
strategic business decisions for the department/agency?
Please provide several noteworthy examples.
(d) What, if any, additional duties or
responsibilities does the official designated as Department
of Education CIO have other than information resources
management?
(e) Do the component organizations that
comprise Department of Education also have designated CIOs?
If so, (1) how are they selected, (2) to whom do they
report, and (3) how is their decisional authority defined by
agency policy?
(f) In accordance with
CCA, has your CIO
provided annual reports to you on improvements in
information resources and technology management
capabilities? If so, please provide copies.
(g) What percentage of Department of
Education total information management and technology
expenditures are controlled or approved by the Department of
Education CIO?
Achieving Benefits From Capital Planning and
Investment Control Processes
2. Has Department of Education implemented
complete and comprehensive IT capital planning and investment
management processes, as required by CCA section 5122(a) and
(b)? If not, what remains to be done and what is the focus of
current efforts?
(a) Please provide the Committee with
Department of Education definition for what
constitutes an IT investment for purposes of this CCA
section.
(b) Approximately how much, and what
percentage, of Department of Education total
IT budget is subject to the IT capital planning and
investment management processes established in your department/agency
(including, as always, its major components)?
(c) Please identify Department of Education
top ten investment initiatives (in terms of total
acquisition dollars) that were approved by the IT capital
planning and investment approval process and are currently
in development or acquisition. Also, for each of these
initiatives, please (1) describe how Department of Education
assessed cost, risk, and return on investment in winning
approval and (2) provide a 1-page exhibit that summarizes
the cost, risk, and return-on-investment data that were used
for the investment decision. (3) How confident are you in
the quality of these data for decision-making?
(d) If uses an executive management level IT
capital planning and investment control group (e.g.,
investment review board, IT investment committee, etc.),
does this group recommend or does it make final IT funding
decisions for the Department of Education? If the group does
not make the final decisions, who does?
(e) What means has your agency provided, in
accordance with CCA section 5122(b)(6), for senior
management personnel to obtain timely information on the
progress of information system investments? (1) To what
extent do these means include a system of milestones for
measuring progress, on an independently verifiable basis, in
terms of cost, capability of the system to meet specified
requirements, timeliness, and quality? (2) How confident are
you that the data beingused for measuring progress are accurate,
reliable, and up-to-date?
(f) Has Department of Education, as required
by CCA section 5127, identified in its strategic information
resources management plan any and all major IT acquisition
programs--or any phase or increment of such programs--that
have significantly deviated from the cost, performance, or
schedule goals established for the program? (1) If so, which
major IT acquisition program(s)? If not, why not? (2)
Whether or not your agency has identified such significant
deviations in its strategic IRM plans, how does your agency
define, for purposes of CCA section 5127, (i) "major IT
acquisition program" and (ii) "significant
deviation"?
Managing IT for Overall Performance and Results
3. As you are aware, CCA requires that executive
agencies measure how well IT is being used to support their
programs. For each of the top ten investment initiatives (in
terms of total acquisition dollars) currently in either
development, acquisition, or operation in Department of
Education, please provide specific data on realized and expected
benefits to major operational or programmatic goals outlined in
your latest Government Performance and Results Act strategic
plan or annual performance plan. Also include the same type of
data for any other investments, currently in development,
acquisition, or operation, that you consider critically
important.
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As required by section 5123 of
CCA,
please provide the Committee with a copy of your last three
annual reports on progress in achieving goals for improving
the efficiency and effectiveness of Department of Education
operations and, as appropriate, its delivery of services
through the effective use of information technology.
Improving Work Processes
4. Since enactment of
CCA, has Department
of Education, in accordance with CCA section 5123, (1)
analyzed its missions and (2) based on the analysis, revised its
mission-related processes and administrative processes, as
appropriate, before making significant investments in IT to be
used in support of the performance of those missions?
Acquiring IT Incrementally (Modular Contracting)
5. What progress has Department of
Education made, and what obstacles still remain, in implementing
modular contracting, in accordance with CCA section 5202?
(a) What criteria does Department of
Education use for determining whether a modular contracting
approach is appropriate or not?
(b) Since CCA’s enactment, what percentage
of Department of Education
major IT
systems investments have used modular contracting? Also,
please indicate which systems and the dollar value of the
contracts.
Contracting for IT
6. Approximately how much did Department of
Education obligate through contract actions for IT products or
services during each of the following fiscal years: 1997, 1998,
and 1999?
-
For each of the three fiscal years, what
percentage of the total dollars were obligated by (1)
issuing orders under existing indefinite delivery,
indefinite quantity (IDIQ) contracts (such as
government-wide contracts (GWACs), federal supply schedule
contracts, etc.) and (2) awarding new contracts or issuing
modifications to those contracts?
Because of upcoming oversight hearings planned
by the Committee in this area, it is critical that the Committee
receive your response by May 18, 2000. After receiving your
response, our staff may want to meet with your representatives
to discuss the information provided. If you or your staff would
like to discuss this request further, please contact Ellen B.
Brown or Susan Marshall of the majority staff at (202) 224-4751
or Debbie Lehrich of the minority staff at (202) 224-2627.
Thank you in advance for your attention to this
issue.
Sincerely,
Fred Thompson
Chairman
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Joseph I. Lieberman
Ranking Minority Member
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FT/sgm
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