Nov 8, 2017 2 min read

Talks between negotiators for striking Ringgold teachers and the Mon Valley school district didn’t result in any developments Wednesday which will return students to classrooms.

Ringgold Education Association President Maria Degnan said the union’s negotiators presented “facts, figures and rationale for our current bargaining position” during the roughly 3 1/2-hour session “in hopes to generate discussion and movement at the table.”

“The Board listened, but was unable to commit to any offer that would get us back in the classroom,” Degnan said in a statement sent out by an official with the state Pennsylvania State Education Association.

Ringgold School Board President William Stein Jr. characterized the meeting as “amiable.”

“Everybody wants our teachers back,” he said.

Stein went on to describe the issues involved as “complicated by four contracts previous to this one,” going back to the late 1990s.

“Both sides are working very hard to end this stalemate and get us back in the classroom,” he added.

The district’s 210 teachers walked off their jobs Oct. 18, with the proposal to freeze them at their current salary steps for five years as one of the biggest stumbling blocks in the path to a new five-year contract.

The union also rejected a fact-finder’s recommendation that would have taken their salaries 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.

The teachers union will hold a town hall meeting at 6 p.m. Thursday at New Eagle Volunteer Fire Department social hall, 165 Main St., to discuss its position, answer questions and hear concerns from the public.

“We’re hoping that anyone who’s interested in the information comes,” Degnan said.

Negotiations are scheduled to continue Monday. Another session is planned for Nov. 20.

The teachers have been directed by the state to return to work Nov. 21 in order for the district’s nearly 3,000 students to receive 180 days of instruction by mid-June.