Hitting the picket lines
Scott Beveridge/Observer-Reporter
Teachers at Ringgold Elementary School South picket in fall 2017 at the Penn Avenue entrance to the building in Carroll Township.
Ringgold Education Association President Maria Degnan, right, joins her fellow teachers Wednesday on the picket line at the entrance to Ringgold High School in Carroll Township.
Ringgold School District was awaiting a decision by the state Wednesday morning to determine how long its teachers can strike to ensure students receive the required 180 days of instruction by mid-June.
Ringgold Education Association President Maria Degnan said the state Department of Education was reviewing the school calendar Wednesday when the district’s 200 teachers walked off the job amid stalled negotiations.
“I feel on our end we did everything to avert this strike,” Degnan said at the picket line at the entrance to the district’s high school along Route 136 in Carroll Township.
“The district did not.”
The teachers began their walkout after last-minute negotiations Tuesday failed to produce an agreement between the two sides.
The teachers, who have been working without a contract since July 1, rejected a fact-finder’s recommendation on a 5-year contract. The main sticking point in the negotiations is salaries.
Degnan said Ringgold teachers are the lowest paid among the 105 school districts in Southwestern Pennsylvania and would have been frozen at their currently salary steps for five years under the fact-finder’s proposal.
The current offer would raise the salary range from between $36,000 and $78,508 a year last term to between $41,439 and $83,947 a year by the end of the contract, depending on education levels and years of employment.
The district claims on its website its student population continues to decline and it no longer has the ability to generate a significant amount of money through real estate tax increases.
Ringgold also sees a high turnover of teachers who stay for a few years to gain experience and then leave to work in another district where their salaries increase about $10,000 year, Degnan said.
She said the union presented the district’s negotiators with a comprehensive proposal Tuesday and “the district came with nothing.” She said the union also offered to take a break Tuesday and return to negotiations at 10 p.m. and the district declined the offer.
Negotiations are set to resume Monday morning at he district’s administration building in New Eagle. Degnan said the teachers, after they return to the classrooms, can call a second strike with the 180-day deadline extended to the end of June.
“The district has to come ready to bargain,” Degnan said.
The high school football game will be played as scheduled Friday where the district also will be honoring seniors who participate in football, cheerleading and band.