Let’s resolve to raise South Dakota teacher salaries. They're among the lowest paid in the nation and deserve better.

Our state’s campaign to recruit workers and their families into South Dakota seems to be overlooking something: teacher pay.

We keep hearing noises from Pierre that South Dakota is focused on bringing more people to this labor-short state. The sales pitch is “freedom,” which has a nice political ring to it but doesn’t seem to be getting much traction. Gov. Kristi Noem’s has invested more than $6 million in a recruitment campaign that so far has yielded little in measurable results.

Why she thinks the promise of an elusive quality like “freedom” is enough of a draw to get people to move to South Dakota is probably part of her political persona, but when it comes to relocating, folks want something much more substantive than that.

In fact, a leading home lender, Homestead Funding Corp., offers a list of the top ten reasons why people move, and “freedom” doesn’t make the cut. People look for tangibles that have to do with personal and professional opportunities. The list isn’t actually ranked, but as it happens, “education” tops the Homestead Funding list.

If that’s so, you have to wonder if potential emigres to South Dakota aren’t put off when they learn that teacher pay in our state is 49th in the country.  

I know personally that the superb teacher quality my family has encountered here has never been in question, but from an out-of-stater’s perspective, it must be a little disconcerting to learn that the teachers in an area being considered for relocation are among the most poorly paid in the country.

Do Gov. Noem and our state representatives even consider that question as they ponder why we can’t get enough workers to alleviate South Dakota’s severe labor shortage?

Some might say that our relatively low cost of living offsets the fact that teacher salaries are so low, but that doesn’t square with the fact that while our cost of living is 33rd highest in the country, teacher pay is near the bottom.

Furthermore, according to the Forbes site where I’m getting this information, South Dakota ranks 48th in disposable income, which is “money left to spend after shelling out for essentials.” Given South Dakota’s average teacher salary for the ‘22-’23 school year of $51,363 (ranking us 49th in the country) our teachers must be a dedicated lot to forgo much better money elsewhere.

And as to “elsewhere,” they don’t have to travel far to get much better money. Education Week, using data from the National Education Association, lists Minnesota as averaging $66,795, Iowa comes in at $60,150, Wyoming pays $61,437, Nebraska is at $58,763, North Dakota at $55,767, and Montana at $55,901. Every one of our contiguous neighboring states pays better than South Dakota. As to the national average?  Education Week says that it is $68,469. 

Meantime, beyond considering what our low wage structure might be doing to our standing in the eyes of potential emigres, there’s the matter of how it’s affecting our ability to keep and hire teachers, especially when you consider that, according to ZipRecruiter, the overall average salary in our state is $57,205 a year, meaning teachers are earning significantly less than the state’s average salary.  That has to be a discouraging outlook for young adults thinking about a career in teaching and probably explains why story after story among South Dakota media at the beginning of the current school year focused on our state’s teacher shortage.  

The shortage is nationwide, so South Dakota doesn’t stand alone. A USA Today story on it last October noted that in school districts around the country, “many potential hires were deterred by low salaries.” It’s a national problem, which might have somewhat of an ameliorating effect when we consider the South Dakota situation, but on further consideration it only means that South Dakota pay scales are at the bottom of an already low national pay structure.  

I don’t think we can reasonably expect a steady supply of excellent teachers to keep our schools staffed if we aren’t willing to pay these outstanding and dedicated professionals the kind of money that will attract them to public education. 

That our teachers are paid less than the average wage in this state is something that we need to address. Let’s make 2024 the year when we do something about it.

John Tsitrian is a businessman and writer from the Black Hills.  He was a weekly columnist for the Rapid City Journal for 20 years.  His articles and commentary have also appeared in The Los Angeles Times, The Denver Post and The Omaha World-Herald.  Tsitrian served in the Marines for three years (1966-69), including a 13-month tour of duty as a radioman in Vietnam.