Teacher Salary in Minnesota 2026,
$76,350 Median | BLS Data by City

A median $76,350 a year per BLS OEWS May 2025 — 19.4% above the national median of $63,970. The middle half falls between $59,250 and $91,290 and the full band runs $48,870 to $100,880. BLS publishes no hourly wage for this occupation, which is reported on an annual basis, and the wage row covers elementary school teachers except special education.

Minneapolis-St. Paul-Bloomington at $79,730, then Rochester $75,770, St. Cloud $73,160, Duluth $65,840 and Mankato $63,070. That sixteen thousand dollar spread is genuinely informative, unlike the flat metro tables most states produce for this occupation, and it reflects real differences in district tax base and bargaining position between the Twin Cities and greater Minnesota.

Minnesota licenses teachers through the Professional Educator Licensing and Standards Board on a four-tier system. Tiers 1 and 2 allow districts to employ a teacher while preparation is completed, with shorter renewal terms and less employment security; Tiers 3 and 4 represent full professional licensure. The tier is a substantive term of employment rather than an administrative label, and lower tiers are used heavily to staff shortage areas in greater Minnesota.

District tax base and bargaining position. Minneapolis-St. Paul-Bloomington at $79,730 sits in a metropolitan area whose districts have deeper local resources and stronger salary schedules than Duluth at $65,840 or Mankato at $63,070 can sustain. The gradient is real and persistent, and it is why greater Minnesota's districts rely more heavily on the lower licence tiers — they are competing for teachers against schedules they cannot match.

Yes, and not primarily for the immediate salary. The higher tiers represent full professional licensure with longer renewal terms and materially greater employment security, and district salary schedules are generally built around fully licensed teachers. A teacher hired on Tier 1 or 2 while completing preparation is in a genuinely different position from one on Tier 3, and the state's band — from $48,870 at the 10th percentile to $76,350 at the median — reflects that difference alongside district variation.

It makes the relationship between preparation and standing explicit, and it changes what a job offer means. In most states a teacher is licensed or not; in Minnesota, the tier attached to your licence determines renewal terms, employment security and, in practice, how a district can use you. That has an equity dimension worth naming: the lower tiers are used most heavily in the greater Minnesota districts that also pay least, so the teachers with the least secure standing are concentrated where resources are thinnest. For an individual entering the profession here, moving to Tier 3 and then Tier 4 is not paperwork — it is the difference between a provisional position and a professional one.

It annualises a contract of roughly nine or ten months and excludes coaching stipends, extended contracts and summer work. It comes from a broad occupation code covering elementary school teachers except special education, so secondary, special education and early childhood teachers sit on related but different schedules. It blends licence tiers that carry quite different employment terms. And it excludes the value of Minnesota's public pension arrangements, which are a substantial part of long-run teacher compensation.

Licence tier first, since Tier 3 and Tier 4 standing is what district salary schedules are built around. District and region second, and in Minnesota this is unusually visible — sixteen thousand dollars between the Twin Cities and Mankato. Graduate degree lane movement third, which produces a defined step in most Minnesota schedules and is the clearest individual lever. Years of service fourth. Shortage-area licensure in special education, mathematics, science and world languages carries real hiring leverage, particularly in greater Minnesota where the shortages are most acute.