Kansas school salaries

Kansas school salaries for superintendents, principals, and teachers presented in an interactive visualization for each district, updated for 2016 data.

Recently Kansas Policy Institute noted the discrepancy in salary increases for Kansas public school management as compared to teachers. See Pay raises to superintendents and principals far outpace those to teachers.

In the article, David Dorsey writes: “A widely-shared solution to improving student outcomes is to put more money in the classroom. What does it say about the importance of student achievement to local school boards and administrations when pay increases are disproportionately higher to those who are not in the classroom?”

And later: “Much has been documented about teacher shortages, especially due to those leaving after only a few years in the profession. One way to reverse that trend would be for districts to make spending choices that would support the commitment to keeping quality teachers.”

Kansas State Department of Education has released salary figures for districts for the current school year, fiscal year 2016. Statewide, since 2008, the KSDE data shows these cumulative salary increases:

Superintendents: 12.2 percent
Principals: 11.8 percent
Teachers: 8.8 percent

If we start the comparison in 2009 the difference is larger, with increases of 8.2 percent for principals and 4.9 percent for teachers.

It’s also useful to look at individual districts. For example, for the Wichita public school district, there are these cumulative salary increases since 2008:

Superintendent: 53.9 percent
Principals: 7.0 percent
Teachers: 2.3 percent

The Wichita district has just one superintendent, so no matter how much the salary rises, it’s still the salary for just a single person and has a negligible effect on total district payroll costs. There are, however, 89 principals, so the increase for this category of employee matters much more.

But you have to wonder: What about the teachers?

I’ve gathered the data and present it in an interactive visualization. You may select any single district, or use district 999 for statewide totals. Click here to open the visualization in a new window. Data is from Kansas State Department of Education. Figures include fringe benefits and are not adjusted for inflation. Visualization created using Tableau Public. There are several missing values which can make the percentage change invalid for a single year.