EDUCATION

Gov. Kristi Noem appoints new member to Board of Education Standards

Sioux Falls Argus Leader

The South Dakota Board of Education Standards meets Monday morning, Nov. 15, 2021 at Carnegie Town Hall. From left to right: board member Julie Westra, board member Phyllis Heineman, senior secretary Ferne Haddock, board president Jacqueline Sly, Secretary of Education Tiffany Sanderson, board vice president Becky Guffin, board member Terry Nebelsick and board member Linda Olsen. Board member Steve Willard is not pictured, as he joined via Zoom.

A new member of the Board of Education Standards has been added, replacing a three-year serving member.

Rich Meyer has taken the place of Jacqueline Sly, who is no longer listed on the Board of Education Standards’ website as a member.

Sly’s four-year term ended Dec. 31, 2021. She was appointed to the board by Gov. Dennis Daugaard and her term started Jan. 1, 2018.

Gov. Kristi Noem appointed Meyer effective April 29 after Sly’s term expired, as per state law, which allows the governor’s office 120 days to reappoint a board member or appoint a new one. His appointment was announced at Friday’s BOES meeting.

Sly taught for 37 years throughout South Dakota, and served in the South Dakota House of Representatives from 2009 to 2016, starting shortly before her teaching certificate expired. During her last two terms, she was chair of the House Education Committee.

Meyer is a retired orthodontist and lives in Rapid City. He’s also a U.S. Army veteran and marketing director of Dakota Labs in Rapid City, according to his LinkedIn page. He isn’t listed on the Department of Education’s educator search as having a teaching certificate at any point.

Meyer served on the social studies standards revision committee last year but he and Rep. Sue Peterson, both conservatives, quit the workgroup in July without publicly saying why at the time. That was before workgroup members revealed the DOE changed the draft of social studies standards they’d agreed upon, including removing more than a dozen references to the Oceti Sakowin.

More:Conservatives resign from group retooling South Dakota social studies standards

Meyer’s term on the BOES will expire in 2025. BOES president Becky Guffin’s term expires in 2022; Phyllis Heineman and Julie Westra’s terms expire in 2023; Terry Nebelsick, Linda Olsen and Steve Willard’s terms expire in 2024.

Guffin, Olsen, Willard and Nebelsick each have an active teaching certificate. Heineman and Westra aren’t listed with the DOE’s educator certificate search.