Your guide to the school board

A quick note: For the sake of brevity, we’re focusing on the Sioux Falls School District (SFSD), but most (if not all) districts in the region operate similarly. You can learn more below about your district if you’re outside of the SFSD boundaries.

As you can see in the infographic above, there's three main facets of Sioux Falls School District’s inner-workings: the five board members, the superintendent, and a combination of administration and community partnerships. Here's what they do:

School board:

• Write and approve policy that works alongside state guidelines.
• Build and approve a yearly budget that supports school adoption of state curriculum.
• Evaluate and appoint the superintendent.
• Act as a community liaison to understand local educational needs.
• Set goals for the superintendent.
• Are elected every three years.

Superintendent:

• Oversees the district’s various administrative departments.
• Collaborates with the school board to achieve annual and long-term goals.
• Oversees initiatives like after-school programming.
• Hires people to roles within school departments like the office of assistant vice principal.

Administration and community partnerships:

• Provide students with additional social and educational opportunities (for example, the various nonprofits who work with the Community Learning Centers)
• Are an area where parents can get involved, like parent teacher organizations (PTO/PTA).
• The district also includes several administrative departments who oversee things like student success, the Office of Indian Education, special education, curriculum service, etc. These administrators report to the superintendent. 

How you can have a say

The primary way you can interact with the School Board is at meetings. Usually the board meets three times per month on Monday evenings. Visit the Sioux Falls School District's website to see meeting dates and times.

To learn more about Sioux Falls school board members, find their email, or see when their term expires, click the button below.

If you want to leave a phone message, call (605) 367-7900 and your message might be relayed to them.

If you want a more timely response, there’s always the community relations office. Click on the blue banner on the right-hand side to find the “Let’s Chat” feature. This allows you to send a text or email chat with the community relations office. 

Ok, but what if you don't live in SFSD boundaries?

As noted above, the Sioux Falls School District is far from the only local education board in the metro area. There are 11 other school districts that overlap with the City of Sioux Falls' boundaries. You can find information on their school boards on each website! 

• Tri-Valley
• West Central
• Parker
• Lennox
• Tea Area
• Harrisburg
• Canton
• Brandon Valley
• Garretson
• Dell Rapids
• Baltic

Not sure where you fall? No worries. Here's a few resources to help you find your district:

• GreatSchools.org lets you type in your address to find your exact district.
• Looking for something more local? Here's a visual map of all 11 districts that border Sioux Falls from the City of Sioux Falls.

The first step to getting involved is knowing what pitfalls to avoid. Here are the top three things we've heard from members of the school board and veteran meeting attendees:

1. Remember that the state sets the education standards, and then the district chooses curriculum to align with those content standards.
2. The yearly budget, meeting agendas and much more can be found on the Sioux Falls School District's website (or whichever district you’re a part of). If you're concerned about a budget item, looking there first is a good first step.
3. There’s several ways to get involved that don’t involve running for school board or even getting super in-the-weeds on policy issues. You can get involved with community learning programs or the Parent Teacher Association (PTA) or Parent Teacher Organization (PTO) affiliated with the school closest to you.

Want more Sioux Falls 101? Learn more here: