Teacher Pay Talks

Posted on Friday, November 2, 2007

Nationally, South Dakota is still dead last in teacher salaries and that has both policymakers and educators talking about ways to increase pay. Some lawmakers would target more money for hard to fill positions like science and math. But Donna DeKraai with the South Dakota Education Association calls differential pay a bad idea because it devalues other teachers. She says paying one group more than others changes the teaching dynamics.

DeKraai says every educator should be valued because they all have the same responsibility to teach children.

DeKraai says the salary of every South Dakota teacher should be increased. She says the neighboring states of Iowa, Minnesota, Wyoming and North Dakota have all done better than South Dakota in recent years when it comes to improving teacher pay.