Catherwood LibraryILR School

The Portland Association of Teachers has filed an unfair labor practice against the Portland Public Schools after administrators refused to bargain over class size. Each side?s final offer was presented last Wednesday after an impasse was declared on November 21st. Unless face-to-fact negotiations resume within 30 days of the presentation of the final offers, whether voluntarily or through an order by the Employee Relations Board, the district could experience its first strike ever in the district?s history. If the Employee Relations Board does not dismiss the teachers? complaint, then the cases would be heard within 20 days and a decision made shortly there-after. The complaint rests on an arbitration award from April of 2012 that limited the number of students that teachers can have in their classes to less than 180 per semester. The district administrators say that class size is a ?permissive? issue, while the union believes that teachers are paid to teach up to a certain number of students and should be paid extra should they be assigned more students than the arbitrator?s award states, thereby making class size a ?mandatory? subject.