Dept. Of Education Working Hard To Spend All Federal Dollars Available

ST. CROIX -- The Department of Education is attempting to break the habit of returning millions of unspent funding to the federal government by working hard to meet the many guidelines before the money can be spent, DOE Assistant Commissioner Chermaine Hobson-Johnson told VI Consortium on Tuesday. Hobson-Johnson, a former principal, was at the Claude O. Markoe library where she spoke to students in grades K-6, giving away books and challenging them to read five or more before September 11. The initiative is part of the 7th annual Governor's Summer Book Reading Challenge, a program started during the John P. de Jongh administration and continued with the current government. "We're going forward and we're going to make things happen. We intend to spend as much of our federal monies as possible, down to zero," Hobson-Johnson said. The assistant commissioner said the territory needs all of the funding that the federal government allocates to the islands. But getting the mone...