By Cathy Chen
<[email protected]>

Teacher contracts for the Carmel Clay school district expired after last school year, and because the teachers and the school board could not agree on a new contract, teachers at this school are currently working without one. The school board declared an impasse, meaning the two sides could not agree and they requested that a mediator be brought in to help resolve the contract issues. Although this may seem to resemble the situation three years ago, school board president Stephen Backer said both parties are handling the negotiation process very differently.

“Last time, it’s my understanding-I wasn’t in it until the end- it was very contentious. People weren’t speaking to each other. It was pretty nasty,” Backer said. “This time, we’re all speaking to each other… I think, at least from our standpoint, there certainly is no animosity.”

According to Karen Taff, member of the Carmel Clay Education Association and history teacher, the key issue on which the teachers and the school board disagree is the financial package. “In a broad sweep, that would be issues of salary, insurance, that sort of thing,” Taff said. “The teachers believe that the package that we put forward is something that is based on the ability of the school board to pay.”

Underwood said that the administration requested a mediator from the Indiana Education Employments Relations Board (IEERB). She said the IEERB sent a letter to her, informing her that they have assigned a mediator to the situation.“In the past, it would just take forever,” Underwood said. “The mediator set mediation for Nov. 12 and 13.”

Taff said the administration did call in a mediator three years ago during the teacher contract negotiations, but she does not know how effective it will be.

“One would hope that that would be a positive experience… We’ve done mediation in the past, and, you know, it has the opportunity to achieve results, I guess,” Taff said.

As to the effect this negotiation process may have on students, Backer said he hopes that there’d be no effect whatsoever, but Taff said it’s still too early to tell if the teachers will need to demonstrate like they did last time.

“You always worry that these things might distract the public from really looking at what our schools, teachers and students do, but I would say that impasse is not a negative. It is simply looking for a third party to assist in the process. And we could have gone on and continued to work like we were but then it does get more frustrating,” Underwood said.

Backer said,“This kind of situation is very unfortunate where you’re forced to negotiate with people that you respect, admire, and 364 out of 365 days you’re all working together, and it’s a very unnatural situation that we’re in,” Backer said. “We think a great deal of the teachers and what they do and hope this can be resolved quickly.” Additional reporting by Brittani Wheeler

Updated on Oct. 22 by Amy Flis to correct information regarding mediation during the last contract.