Nov 9, 2015 3 min read

The Peters Township School District’s 285 teachers will remain on strike until Nov. 27.

The two sides met for more than three hours Monday and were not able to come to an agreement that would enable the 4,300 students in the district to return to the classroom.

As of now, no additional talks between the two sides have been scheduled, said Paul Homer, staff representative of Peters Township Federation of Teachers Local 3431.

“We are on strike for the duration,” said Homer, himself a former Peters Township teacher, who along with members of his negotiating committee left shortly after 1 p.m. None of the teachers present at Monday’s talks offered any comment.

There had been hopes on both sides that an agreement would be reached this time, the 19th meeting between the two sides since January.

The teachers, a delegation of around 10, arrived first at Monday’s session. District officials arrived 20 minutes later. The teachers have been working without one since Aug. 31, the first day of school in the district.

During the meeting, the district removed its request that teachers’ work year be 197 days,

“Financial constraints prevent the district from meeting the PTFT’s economic demands,” said Superintendent Jeannine French in a statement issued after the meeting. “We can negotiate over matters the PTFT views as ‘quality of life,’ but both sides need to be at the table to move forward and get our children back in the classroom.” French was present at Monday’s talks.

Again, the district offered to move immediately to non-binding final best offer arbitration. The union declined, the district said. Mediators indicated that future meetings would not be requested by their office. The district, however, said it has contacted PTFT for another date to meet.

It is still not clear how the district will make up the school time for its 4,300 students because it is not absolutely clear if there will be another meeting. And if a second strike happened, in all likelihood it would push the last day of school until June 30th. It is a state law that students must get 180 days of instruction.

Also, a second strike can only take place after both the district and the teachers have exhausted fact finding and non-binding final best offers, according to Act 88, a law enacted in 1992 that governs how contract talks between the teachers and the district are conducted, as well as how long a school strike can last.

During the strike, teachers are not paid, but will receive their salaries retroactively. Also affected by the work stoppage are 100 district employees, such as cafeteria workers and monitors, who work only when school is in session. They too are not being paid during the strike