March 10, 2026:
The Pierre School District is reshaping the boundaries for its three elementary schools as it adjusts the number of grade school sections from nine, down to eight because of declining enrollment.
Superintendent Dr. Kelly Glodt talked through how the boundary lines would move during this week’s school board meeting (March 9, 2026).
Glodt said changing the elementary school districts directly affects fewer than two-dozen students.
Glodt said parents will still be able to apply for their student to open enroll to their preferred elementary school. But, he said, the number of students in the same grade who are already assigned to the desired school will determine whether or not the open enrollment application is approved.
The Pierre School Board will give final approval to the new elementary school districts at a future meeting.
2026 proposed revision to Pierre elementary school boundaries.
Courtesy image.
Current Pierre elementary school boundaries.
Courtesy image.
Feb. 11, 2026:
The Pierre School District is doing some shifting of students and staff in order to make its budget work for the 2026-27 academic year.
Superintendent Dr. Kelly Glodt says Pierre has had declining enrollment for the past few school years, including this year.
Looking at the entire school district budget picture, Glodt says something needed to change. He says current enrollment numbers show the place to make that change right now is at the elementary school level.
Glodt says after considering three different options, administrative staff decided reducing elementary classrooms from nine sections of grades K-5 to eight sections would be the least disruptive. He says the next question became, which elementary school to reduce from three sections to two?
Glodt says school district staff was told about the need to make an adjustment last month (Jan. 11, 2026). Since then, he says the administrative team has been working with staff to figure out how to make the reduction as painlessly as possible.
Glodt says they’ll need to shift some students from Jefferson over to the Buchanan and Kennedy Elementary Schools.
Glodt says the school district will let parents of affected students at Jefferson Elementary know about the need to switch schools as soon as possible, while students that are open enrolled to Jefferson, should already plan to go to one of the other two elementary schools next year.
Some Pierre School District residents question why the classroom reduction needs to happen when the district has money to build a wrestling room and expand the theater at T.F. Riggs High School. The short answer, according to Glodt, is they’re paid for out of two different pools of money– the General Fund and the Capital Outlay Fund. In the recent past, the South Dakota Legislature made a change to allow school districts to transfer up to 45% of the money in their Capital Outlay Fund to supplement their General Fund….but it’s not a strategy Glodt recommends using.
Pierre is a “capital outlay poor” school district because capital outlay funds come from property taxes; However, South Dakota State Government owns many buildings within the Pierre School District, but is typically not required to pay property tax.
Photo credit to Jody Heemstra, DRG Media Group.
Photo credit to Jody Heemstra, DRG Media Group.
Photo credit to Jody Heemstra, DRG Media Group.
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