SIOUX FALLS, S.D. (KELO.com) — The Sioux Falls School District has nearly completed teacher hiring for the coming school year, but 106 nonteaching positions remain vacant, according to a human resources report at the school board’s Monday meeting.
The district has hired 145 teachers, up from 130 last year, while 85 percent of candidates offered contracts accepted them. Those numbers put teacher hiring within the district’s recent range as students prepare to return to school. But the district hired far fewer experienced teachers from nearby South Dakota districts, and support-staff vacancies are slightly higher than they were at this point last year.
“The central message is that hiring has progressed well, but workforce competition remains intense,” Senior Director of Human Resources Becky Dorman told the Sioux Falls School Board. The district also needs at least 250 substitute employees by late fall.
The district received 1,216 teacher applications and hired 145 teachers: 63 elementary, 41 middle and 25 high school teachers. The remaining hires include early childhood teachers, school specialists and one auxiliary-site teacher.
Forty-one percent of the new teachers are entering the profession, while 64 percent have fewer than five years of teaching experience. Fifty-six new teachers worked for the district in another role last year, including 38 substitute teachers and 11 education support professionals. Dorman said the district still had three special education vacancies Monday — one at a middle school and two at high schools.
Special education has been one of the district’s most difficult areas to staff for the past five to seven years, she said.
One number stood out from an otherwise relatively stable hiring report. The district hired 13 experienced teachers from South Dakota school districts within an hour of Sioux Falls, down from 24 last year — a 46 percent decrease. The total ties 2021–22 for the lowest in the six years included in the district report.
Dorman said the district needs to determine whether the decline signals a tighter pool of experienced teachers or a one-year anomaly. At the same time, the district relied less on alternative certification. It hired 13 alternatively certified teachers this year, or 9 percent of new hires, compared with 38 teachers and 26 percent two years ago.
One number stood out from an otherwise relatively stable hiring report.
The district hired 13 experienced teachers from South Dakota school districts within an hour of Sioux Falls, down from 24 last year — a 46 percent decrease. The total ties 2021–22 for the lowest in the six years included in the district report.
support and other nonteaching positions but had 106 vacancies as of July 31.
The district also needs at least 250 substitute employees by late fall.
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