One of the state’s most prominent education leaders met with PragerU representatives about the conservative nonprofit’s curriculum in January, according to emails EdNews obtained through a public records request. 

By October, the state endorsed the controversial curriculum. At that time, state superintendent Debbie Critchfield told EdNews that she started looking into partnering with PragerU after Treasure Valley patrons asked her to do so in “June-ish.”

But email records show PragerU’s curriculum was on the state’s radar much earlier.

Greg Wilson, Critchfield’s chief of staff, first met with PragerU representatives on Jan. 10. The next week, Dzana Homan, PragerU’s head of education outreach, emailed Wilson to express her “sincere appreciation” for his “readiness to introduce the implementation of PragerU Supplemental Education content to Superintendent Critchfield.” 

“Please let me know if there’s anything I can do to further assist in preparing you for a conversation with the Superintendent Crishfield (sic),” she wrote. 

That January meeting was “preliminary in nature,” according to Scott Graf, the Idaho Department of Education’s communications director. “We tabled any further substantive discussion at that point,” Graf wrote in a Wednesday email to EdNews. Discussions with PragerU were “revived” in early summer when Critchfield “began to hear from constituents about their interest in seeing the materials made available in Idaho,” Graf wrote.

PragerU representatives spent months pushing Wilson to connect them with Critchfield, the emails show. She eventually met with them in late July, and by September the state and PragerU were in accelerated talks. By Oct. 24, the partnership was made official with coordinated, joint announcements.

Read more about PragerU and its curriculum here, and about reactions to the curriculum in Idaho here. 

The emails EdNews obtained shine a light on the months-long process  — previously out of the public eye — that led up to Critchfield’s endorsement of the conservative curriculum.

Idaho is one of a handful of states that have partnered with PragerU, a conservative nonprofit that “offers a free alternative to the dominant left-wing ideology in culture, media, and education.” The curriculum is supplemental and not required — school trustees must approve the curriculum at the local level before it can be used in classrooms. 

PragerU repeatedly requested a Critchfield meeting. It happened months later, and talks quickly accelerated. 

Homan first emailed Wilson in December 2023. He took a meeting in January, but then seemed to keep PragerU at a distance. For months, Homan persistently emailed Wilson to request a meeting with Critchfield  — which eventually happened, but not until July 31. 

Homan also had access to Critchfield’s personal email address, and on Aug. 1, emailed Wilson to ask for her “business email,” which he provided the following day.

A constituent gave Critchfield’s personal Gmail address to PragerU, Graf said, and Critchfield did not receive or send any PragerU-related emails from her Gmail account.

After the first meeting with Critchfield on July 31, reciprocal communications between the state and PragerU seemed to pick up.

In August and September, there were at least three more video meetings between state officials and PragerU representatives.

And on Sept. 30, Homan sent Wilson a copy of PragerU’s curriculum and its alignment with Idaho’s content standards, requesting feedback by Oct. 9. Wilson said the state’s curriculum and content staff would look it over.

He provided feedback eight business days later, as requested: “Overall, it looks good to us.”

In October, PragerU said its curriculum went through a “rigorous approval process” before Idaho accepted it. 

When asked how much time curriculum staffers spent looking over the materials, Graf said the “department’s review of the materials began in July and concluded in October,” and entailed looking at the PragerU content itself, and its alignment with state social studies standards. Critchfield told EdNews in October that she spent her summer reviewing the materials. 

When for-profit publishers want their content to be state-approved, it goes through a public, multistep review process and must be OK’d by a committee of stakeholders and by the State Board of Education. But “open resource providers, or those who make their material available to users at no cost, rarely go through this process,” Graf said. PragerU created and provided its curriculum at no cost to Idaho taxpayers or schools.

By the end of September, IDE staff members were also working with PragerU on content to roll out with the announcement of their partnership, including a video interview with Critchfield. The IDE proofread and approved the questions she was asked beforehand, provided suggestions for B-roll to be included in the video, and reviewed the video before it was released.

PragerU also mentioned its close working relationship with Breitbart News Network, a conservative news outlet, and offered to work with them or another outlet on an “exclusive article” about the partnership with Idaho. 

The state declined the offer.

Idaho Education News data analyst Randy Schrader contributed to this report.