An ambitious $2.2 million project designed to help rookie educators survive their first year in the District of Columbia’s schools was severely undermined because officials didn’t disburse the funds and didn’t tell many school principals it was available for new teachers.

The New Teacher Center at the University of California, Santa Cruz, offered to set up a mentoring program for hundreds of new teachers entering the D.C. schools, center Executive Director Ellen Moir said. In 2005, the center received a $750,000 grant from the Wachovia Foundation, and the D.C. schools committed another $1.5 million, school spokeswoman Mafara Hobson said.