DOVER, Pa. — Voters have decided to replace nearly the entire school board with a slate that calls for removing "intelligent design" from Dover's high school science curriculum, after the new policy landed the district in federal court.

Eight of nine school board members were up for election yesterday, and all eight were voted out in a showdown over how evolution is to be taught and the cost of the district's policy on intelligent design.

The vote came on the same day that intelligent-design advocates won a victory in Kansas, where the state Board of Education approved science standards for public schools that cast doubt on the theory of evolution.

The Pennsylvania election unfolded as a judge considers evidence presented in a landmark six-week federal trial over whether the concept of intelligent design promotes the Bible's view of creation.

The Dover school board approved a policy in 2004 requiring ninth-graders to hear a prepared statement about intelligent design before learning about evolution in biology class. Intelligent design holds that the universe is so complex that it must have been created by some kind of higher force.

Some voters indicated yesterday that their decision to vote against the incumbents, who backed the current policy, was as much about the cost of the litigation as the debate over evolution.

Barb Brillhart, a 66-year-old retired school cafeteria worker, said she voted for the opposition slate.

"Every year I get my tax bill and it goes higher and higher. I know the lawsuit that was brought is going to cost taxpayers money," she said.

School board member David Napierskie, one of those who lost re-election, said he heard similar concerns.

"Some people felt intelligent design shouldn't be taught and others were concerned about having tax money spent on the lawsuit," he said.

U.S. District Judge John E. Jones III expects to rule by January on the lawsuit, brought by eight families. The winners of the school board race are to be sworn in on Dec. 5.

Eight of the nine school board members were up for election; six of the incumbents were appointed within the past year to temporarily fill vacancies created by resignations. They were challenged by a slate known as Dover Citizens Actively Reviewing Educational Strategies, or Dover CARES.

The Rev. Warren Eshbach, a Dover CARES spokesman, had said that if the opposition candidates won a majority on the board, they would not act hastily to revise the curriculum.

"The guiding force for this group is going to be Judge Jones' decision," Eshbach said.

On a street near a major polling station, about 20 high school students waved signs and cheered in support of the candidates seeking to unseat the current school board. The rally was organized by Megan Kitzmiller, 17, a senior whose mother is one of the plaintiffs in the lawsuit seeking to remove intelligent design from the science curriculum.

"It's a nice way to stand up for our beliefs," she said.

Jill Reiter, 41, a bank teller with two children in high school, joined the students.

"My kids believe in God. I believe in God. But I don't think it belongs in the science curriculum the way the school district is presenting it," she said. "Put it in an elective class where those students who want to learn about it or get deeper involved can choose to take that class."

Karen Adams, 29, mother of a first-grader, supported the incumbents.

"If they can teach evolution, something I don't believe in, then they (students) should hear the other side of the story," she said.