The Build Dakota Scholarship is a total of $50 million dollars donated by T. Denny Sanford and the South Dakota Future Fund to help students attending the state’s technical schools. In order to receive financial help, a student must enroll in a high demand field of study and work in that field for three years, after graduation, within South Dakota.
Tiffany Sanderson is the Director of Career and Technical Education at the Department of Education, and she says they awarded about 250 full ride scholarships this first year.

Just over 1,000 students applied, and all four of the state’s technical schools were all well represented in those applications. Each school received about a million dollars through the scholarships this year. Sanderson says for a one-year program, the size of the scholarship was about 12 to 13 thousand dollars.

Sanderson says the scholarships have already made impacts on students who may not have had the opportunity for higher education without the scholarship. She says employers are excited about the workforce development effort that benefits both students and businesses.