On Wednesday October 7 at 4:30 p.m., the district negotiation team and the Lawrence Education Association (LEA) representatives met in the Lawrence High auditorium to discuss teachers’ contracts for this academic year and years following.

Chief Operations Officer of Administrative Support Frank Harwood represented the district, while Lois Orth-Lopes, music teacher at Cordley Elementary was the main speaker for the LEA. Teachers across the district were in attendance. The heated issue for most in attendance was salary.  

The district proposed an alteration in the salary schedule that would give an average of 1.3 percent salary increase to teachers. While this is an increase for newer teachers, teachers who have been in the district for over 14 years are seeing no increase in pay. This accounts for approximately 45 percent of teachers in the district.

While the negotiators caucused, teachers formed clusters and talked through the provisions.

Behavioral Specialist David Unruh, the unofficial LEA party whip, rallied the crowd.

“How many of you are in that 45 percent percent that aren’t getting a raise?”

Hands shot up emphatically.

“So what are you going to say when they ask us to vote on the contract?”

“No!” the crowd roared.

Unruh’s frenzy was not enough to keep LEA representatives from accepting the district’s salary negotiations.

However, the LEA teachers’ union vote is yet to come, and this will determine the true outcome. Teachers have never voted down a contract before, but with a new high school opening in Blue Valley providing competition, teachers may choose to bargain further.

Other notable negotiations include:

• Employees with a Flexible Savings Account (FSA) can change their coverage to Heath Savings Account (HSA) or 0 percent, 15 percent or 30 percent buy-up if desired.
• Pay for regular and special education teachers who must attend IEP meetings outside the duty day has not been granted.
• Additional plan time for elementary school teachers has not been granted.
• If the schools are reconfigured, employees will abide by the same contract used by the majority of the school. For example, if a 9^th grade teacher moves up to the high school setting, his/her contract will match the contract of the other high school teachers in the building.
• Retaining a position in a Reduction of Force (RIF) situation if the employee is “not currently on problematic employee status.” This is a change: originally the contract stated that the employee could not of been on problematic status in the last two years.