BOISE -- The state Board of Education told Schools Superintendent Marilyn Howard Friday it would make up to $50,000 available for administering the statewide mathematics and science initiative this year.
In a letter to Howard, Board Director Gary Stivers acknowledged the board was using much of the federal administration money to hire its own staff to assume control next year of the initiative that Howard and Gov. Dirk Kempthorne joined forces to create several years ago.
Both consider the initiative very successful, and Stivers said the $50,000 would be freed to organize teacher training programs this year and allow "time for a systematic transfer of the responsibilities to the Office of the State Board of Education."
The seeming concession after three separate instances in which the board affirmed its intention to retain control of all that money followed a letter from Howard to Kempthorne before Christmas.
Howard, the only statewide elected Demo-crat, told the Republican governor that the board had withheld the federal money for the initiative and her department was left with no alternative but to eliminate it.
The debate over the math initiative is the latest installment in what Democrats see as an attempt by the seven other state board members, all appointed by Kempthorne, to strip Howard of authority.
But Friday's letter from Stivers appeared to contradict the position taken by the board in June and essentially reaffirmed in November and December that the board would control the more than $450,000 in federal cash used in the past for the teacher training initiative.
About $345,000 has been used for conferences that focus on showing teachers how to teach better and over $100,000 paid for the staff time needed to put those conferences together. Howard has been using existing staff for planning and charging the time they spend on the initiative to the federal grant.
At the December board meeting, she specifically asked the board to approve allocation of that money to her department to finance this year's initiative effort and none of the other board members offered to support that.
Stivers followed up with a Dec. 15 letter advising Howard that Allison McClintick on the board staff would be the primary person handling that money.
