The Salt Lake City School District’s new superintendent is set to earn $35,000 more than his predecessor

Here’s how her contract compares to the last two superintendents.

New Salt Lake City School District Superintendent Elizabeth Grant is expected to earn a higher salary than the district’s past two superintendents.

According to Grant’s two-year contract, which The Salt Lake Tribune obtained through an open filing request, she receives an annual salary of $255,000 per year. That amount will increase each year based on cost-of-living adjustments “and any other negotiated increase that other administrators receive,” the contract says.

Grant signed the contract, which runs from July 1, 2023 to June 30, 2025, at a brief school board meeting on Thursday. Her salary and contract terms were not disclosed at the time.

Compared to Timothy Gadson’s 2021 contract and Lexi Cunningham’s 2018 contract — both also obtained through Government Records Access and Management Act applications — Grant’s salary is tens of thousands of dollars higher.

According to the document, Cunningham, who was hired in 2016, was paid an annual salary of $202,044 with annual cost-of-living adjustments as part of her 2018 contract.

Gadson was paid $220,000 a year. Gadson’s contract also listed over $21,000 in moving expenses, including extra money for storage and other moving expenses.

“If you look at comparable positions along the Wasatch front, the salary is [for Grant] is competitive and in line with the benchmarks mentioned,” district spokesman Yándary Chatwin said in an email.

Grant was most recently an Associate Professor of Education at George Washington University’s Graduate School of Education.

Currently, interim superintendent Martin Bates earns a salary similar to Gadson’s, $220,000 a year, or $18,333 a month — while Gadson continues to earn his own salary despite stepping down on Oct. 1.

Under the separation agreement between Gadson and the school board, Gadson will receive a monthly salary of $18,251 from the district as a school board advisor through June 2023, regardless of whether members use his services. And according to Chatwin, the district has not requested any consulting services from him.

[Read more: Salt Lake City will pay former schools superintendent $200,000 under separation agreement]

All three were offered 20 days of vacation and five personal vacation days as benefits. Additionally, similar to Gadson and Cunningham, Grant receives the same health and insurance benefits as other 12-month administrators in the county.

One difference was the additional wording in Grant’s contract regarding the new superintendent’s “outside activities”.

In addition to stating that it is permitted “to act as a consultant for other districts or educational institutions, give lectures, and engage in other activities of short-term duration, as it sees fit,” the clause adds that these outside activities “constitute the shall not interfere with work.” Faithful performance of their work and duties on behalf of the District.”

Former Superintendent Gadson was asked about a trip to Grand Canyon University, a private, for-profit Christian university where he previously taught before moving to Salt Lake City County.

But Chatwin said the additional wording wasn’t included in Grant’s contract for a reason, saying it was “due to the different styles of editorial counsel for each contract.”