BHSU granted $2.1 million from agency Republicans are abolishing

The South Dakota Board of Regents and US Department of Education funding drove the GEAR UP scandal and Westerhuis murders. Republican former Governor Mike Rounds ran for US Senate calling for the abolition of the DoED saying it is a source of corrupting influence in South Dakota.

Those and myriad other nefarious developments spurred some in the state to boost civic engagement and even reconcile historic truths maybe even probe deeper into South Dakota's own history of ethnic cleansing. That the resulting hangout dedicated to exceptionalism would be located at a university built on stolen treaty ground especially with money from a doomed agency is a draft of the American Saga only Earth haters could concoct. 

Black Hills State University was recently awarded a $2.1 million grant to support civic education in South Dakota. The grant was awarded by the U.S. Department of Education’s American History and Civics Education-Seminars program, which serves to promote new and existing evidence-based strategies to encourage innovative American history, civics and government, and geography instruction. Their game portfolio includes several published simulations on events in the nation’s founding. [BHSU press release]

Future fund recipients, Kathryn Johnson, a former member of the Board of Regents implicated in the EB-5/Bendagate scandal, and her husband, prominent Rapid City attorney, Doyle Estes, are longtime contributors to Pierre's culture of corruption. Prior to her departure Johnson capriciously switched her voter registration to Democrat after being called out for imbalance on SDBOR. Doyle Estes was disciplined by the State Bar in February over an ethics breach and went before the South Dakota Supreme Court after defrauding the City of Rapid City. 

A life-sciences building on the campus of Black Hills State University has alumna, Johnson's name on it.