Pay follows the size of the district

The more pupils a district has, the more it pays: size alone accounts for 50% of the differences between superintendents’ salaries. So each district is held against districts of its own size: low below the middle half of them, high above it, and typical in between.

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Pupils are the enrolled count the state reports for 2024-25. Districts count here only where one person held the post the whole year; the ranges leave out a post that changed hands or was shared.

Since 2005-06

The middle district paid its superintendent $94,542 in 2005-06 and $135,594 in 2024-25: +43%, while prices rose 60% over the same years. Treasurers’ pay rose 68%, and teachers’ 33% since 2009-10 (prices: 47%).

• Superintendent$135,594
• Treasurer$112,444
• Average teacher$69,188

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Each year’s middle is taken over the same districts this page lists, from the state’s staff records; the teachers’ from the District Profile report, which begins in 2009-10. Not the state’s own statewide average, which also counts community schools, career centers and educational service centers. Prices: the consumer price index (CPI-U) over each school year, July to June.

Adams County’s districts

Show one county All of Ohio Adams Allen Ashland Ashtabula Athens Auglaize Belmont Brown Butler Carroll Champaign Clark Clermont Clinton Columbiana Coshocton Crawford Cuyahoga Darke Defiance Delaware Erie Fairfield Fayette Franklin Fulton Gallia Geauga Greene Guernsey Hamilton Hancock Hardin Harrison Henry Highland Hocking Holmes Huron Jackson Jefferson Knox Lake Lawrence Licking Logan Lorain Lucas Madison Mahoning Marion Medina Meigs Mercer Miami Monroe Montgomery Morgan Morrow Muskingum Noble Ottawa Paulding Perry Pickaway Pike Portage Preble Putnam Richland Ross Sandusky Scioto Seneca Shelby Stark Summit Trumbull Tuscarawas Union Van Wert Vinton Warren Washington Wayne Williams Wood Wyandot

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For its size holds the superintendent’s salary against districts with as many pupils (the table above). Superintendent ÷ teacher is the superintendent’s salary over the district’s average teacher salary. Test scores is the Performance Index rank among Ohio’s school districts, and Progress the Report Card’s rating of how much pupils grew; scores follow family income closely, so the two sit together. They are beside the pay for reading together; neither says the pay caused the scores.

The 88 counties

Each county’s middle district: half its districts pay more and half less. A district counts in the county it is based in.

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A county’s middle district is the middle of those with one superintendent the whole year, and a county with none shows a dash.

Where the figures come from

The salary is what each district reports to the state for the post: the contract’s annual pay, as the state’s staff records hold it, for 2024-25. Where the post changed hands during the year, the figure is the average yearly rate of those who held it; a shared post (one treasurer for two districts, say) shows the full-time rate the share is paid at. A figure under $40,000 is a part year or an hourly rate rather than a salary, and is left out.

With benefits is our estimate, not the state’s figure. Many Ohio contracts add to the salary, and the state’s figure leaves these out, so we add what a contract usually carries:

• The retirement pickup: the board pays the employee’s own share to the retirement system, 14% of salary to STRS for a superintendent and 10% to SERS for a treasurer. A 2025 bill would have banned it for new contracts; the Governor vetoed that part.
• An annuity or deferred compensation: a yearly deposit we put at 5% of salary for a superintendent and 2% for a treasurer. Contracts we read ranged from $500 a year to $40,000.
• Allowances: a car, a phone and life insurance, $5,000 a year for a superintendent and $1,000 for a treasurer.

Health insurance and the board’s own retirement share are left out, because every employee has them. A district’s own contract can sit well above or below the estimate; it is posted with the board’s minutes when it is approved.

No names appear here: the state’s report carries none, and the page is about what the post costs a district.

Ohio Department of Education and Workforce, Education Employee Positions and Demographics: average salary and FTE by district for superintendents, treasurers and teachers, every year from 2005-06 to 2024-25. Pupils and the average teacher salary: the District Profile report. Test scores: the Performance Index and Value-Added rankings. Updated each January, when the state publishes the year before.