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State Board’s systemwide unit briefs JFAC on research transfers and a small FY26 training request for minors on campus
Summary
Legislative analyst Kevin Campbell and State Board director Joshua Woodworth described the college and university systemwide budget, transfers to institutions for research, and a small FY2026 request for training materials related to minors on campus.
Kevin Campbell, a budget and policy analyst with the Legislative Services Office, presented an overview of the College and University Systemwide budget, telling JFAC the program is housed in the Office of the State Board of Education and chiefly serves to transfer funds to institutions for research and systemwide initiatives.
“Systemwide is a mechanism for getting funding to researchers and to research projects located within the colleges and universities,” Campbell said, noting Systemwide has a base budget of about $6.4 million, of which roughly $4 million is typically transferred to institutions. Campbell said the unit has 2.5 FTP and that spend patterns after transfers place about 74.5% of expenditures in operating categories, 14.7% in trustee and benefit payments, and roughly 10% in personnel.
Campbell summarized recent FY2024 enhancements that included support for online learning platforms and the Apply Idaho admissions tool and said Systemwide had no enhancement requests in FY2025. For FY2026 Systemwide requested $15,000 to fund training materials related to minors on campus — a request the analyst said was intended to address the broader systemwide implications of increased dual‑credit and youth participation in campus programs.
Joshua Woodworth, director for the State Board of Education, told members that younger students appear on campus for more than dual credit — camps and other programs bring minors to campuses and create additional operational and liability considerations. “This is just to make sure that our institutions understand what they have to do to prepare for having students on campus,” Woodworth said.
Campbell said the Higher Education Research Council funding had been shifted between ongoing and one-time accounts in recent years and that a FY2026 correction of $3,600 to the CEC calculation was requested. There was no formal committee action recorded in the transcript during the briefing.
The presentation framed Systemwide as a relatively stable budget unit whose primary role is to route research funding and to address systemwide administrative needs.
