By Chuck Friedbauer

Now that District 112 teachers have turned down a contract proposal, members of the two negotiating sides are turning their attention to what comes next.

Items such as the appropriate starting point and desired timeline lead that list.

Tim Griffin, president of the Chaska Education Association, made it clear the path the teachers union prefers. “I invite the bargaining committee to return to the bargaining table to work for a fair and competitive settlement acceptable to both sides,” said Griffin.

District 112 Superintendent David Jennings said he likes the idea of heading back to the more traditional negotiation process.“I agree with Griffin’s invitation to return to the bargaining table,” he said. “But all options are still open, including traditional negotiations, continue the mediation or proposing arbitration.”

The timing to continue the negotiations is not clear, however.

“Our goal is to have the union negotiators meet and develop a survey by Jan. 22 to send out to our teachers,” said Griffin. “The survey will give the teachers the opportunity to give feedback on what would need to change from the proposed contract to be acceptable.”

One item that may be a critical issue is teacher pay for time spent in the district, commonly referred to as “steps.”

The recent rejected contract proposal included teacher pay for continuing education, called “lanes,” a one-time $440 stipend and increased contributions to health care costs, but no steps.

Information from the CEA and the Minnesota teacher trade union, Education Minnesota, indicates recent settled contracts for local school districts such as Eden Prairie, Minnetonka, Waconia and Burnsville all included steps and lanes.

“In past negotiations, we’ve used these schools as our standards to determine what a fair contract was,” contends Griffin.  Connie Kettler, a teacher at Jonathan Elementary, said steps are important to teachers.

“If the contract would have passed without steps, I would have been at the same [pay level] for seven years, while my monthly check has fallen about $164 due to rising health care costs and the FICA error payback,” she said. “The offer is very disrespectful.”

Jennings said the management negotiating team doesn’t make a conscious effort to not include steps, but instead looks at the options it has to use the available money.

“Given a limited resource, the team determines what the options are to do the most good,” he said. “Steps are a pay raise, but not for everyone, as they generally affect less senior teachers.

Jennings added the last two settlements included teacher pay raises greater than inflation designed to increase salaries and be more competitive with other districts.

“Those settlements did not include increases in district contributions for health care, however,” he said. “Those costs have been going up and that portion [of the rejected contract] would go to every single teacher.”

State comparisons

Education Minnesota, the Minnesota teacher trade union, estimates 28 of the state’s 344 school districts did not meet the Jan. 15 deadline to reach settlements with their teachers. It reports other local districts yet to settle as Edina, Minneapolis and the Carver Scott County Educational Cooperative.

Districts that failed to meet the Jan. 15 deadline are fined $25 per student by the state. For District 112, that means a fine of about $220,000. “From the beginning of the time when we realized that a settlement was not easily forthcoming and that the deadline was nearing, the board was very clear with the CEA negotiators that the effect of this payment to the state would be to reduce the amount of money left for negotiations purposes,” Jennings said, regarding the state penalty.

“There simply is nowhere else to go for the money. With the year more than half over, the majority of the other funds in the budget are already committed and the money set aside for salary negotiations is the only budget account that has remained unused at this point. The board has also indicated that they do not plan to tap into the district's already limited budget reserve for this purpose.”

Of those districts that have settled, more than half involved teachers accepting salary freezes for one or both years of the two-year contract. Salary increases averaged approximately 0.77 percent for the first year and 0.96 percent in the second, which Education Minnesota reports is the lowest settlements on record. The contract proposal rejected by the CEA would have been an increase of approximately $2 million over the previous contract, about 2 percent each year.

“Teachers are making historic sacrifices for the sake of their students,” said Education Minnesota President Tom Dooher.

According to Education Minnesota, the state ranked 16th in the nation in average teacher salary in 2005 and 20th this year, with an average teacher salary in Minnesota of $51,938, compared to the national average of $54,333. The average starting salary for a Minnesota teacher is $33,009.

Locally, according to District 112, a new teacher starting in its schools under the existing contract with a bachelor’s of arts degree would earn $35,717 or $39,603 with a master’s degree.

The maximum salary a teacher could earn is $77,261 for those individuals with more than 25 years of service and having earned a doctorate or educational specialist degree.

Recently settled teacher contracts

School District    Steps Included?  Lanes Included?         Percent Increases*

Eden Prairie         Yes                        Yes                              0.42/0.58

Minnetonka           Yes                        Yes                              1.9/1.65

Waconia              Yes                         Yes                                1.0/1.0

* Overall contract increases in the first and second years of the two-year contracts, respectively.

Source: Chaska Education Association and Education Minnesota