By: Dan Sokil

Instead of going to their first day of school Tuesday morning, students in the Souderton Area School District were greeted with closed doors and picketing teachers.

Actually, the only students there on Tuesday were 16 or so seniors, holding their own sit-in across the street from their striking teachers.

"We're not really here to support the teachers or the school board, but we feel that we're the only group that really hasn't had our voice heard," said senior Bianca Cavacini.

Cavacini and fellow senior Liz Kramlik started organizing their gathering just Monday night, but by Tuesday morning they along with fellow seniors had set up signs and chairs and were tossing Frisbees and footballs in the parking lot.

"We just want people to know that we want to be here; I'm a senior and this affects me too," said Kramlik.

"I'm taking AP classes this year, and we'll have to take those tests in May even if we haven't gotten that far in our classes yet," Cavacini said.

As she spoke, about 40 members of

the Souderton Area Education Association, the union representing the district's teachers, marched in front of the district's high school, many of them wearing the school's colors of red and white and carrying signs that read "On Strike" or "We Want a Contract."

"We're on strike today because we were not able to reach a contract agreement with the school board," said SAEA president Bill Lukridge, "so we've been out here since 7 a.m. and we have people out at nine of the district schools, plus at the new high school (being built in Franconia)."

School district officials, including Superintendent Charles Amuso and district negotiating head Jeffrey Sultanik, held a press conference Tuesday to share their perspective on the school stoppage.

"Today's usually a day that we as educators look forward to every year, but I am very disappointed to say that we have an indefinite delay in the first day of school this year," Amuso said.

Sultanik described how far apart the two sides remain in their respective contract proposals, noting that the SAEA's latest contract proposal seeks an average 8.2 percent salary increase over each of the next four years.

"I've been doing these kinds of negotiations for a long time, and I'm not aware of any teachers union that has elected to go out on strike and hurt their children's education while they have an 8.2 percent increase on the table," Sultanik said.

Furthermore, the district negotiator explained that while the Souderton Area is the largest school district by land area in the county, the tax base to support that kind of salary increase just does not exist.

"In the Souderton Area, we just do not see the extent of commercial development you see in eastern Montgomery County, which means tax revenues that do not produce children too," he said.

"We do have a strong tax base, but the growth we see is primarily in residential areas. We're in the business of educating students in this district, but it does cost money to educate each one of those students," Sultanik said.

The two other unions negotiating new contracts, those for the district's secretaries and teaching assistants, have not gone on strike and are awaiting negotiation dates from the state arbiter, said R. Bradley Clemens, assistant to the superintendent/director of human resources.

"The secretaries union, in fact, is reworking their proposal, and we've just received that notice within the last week," Clemens said.

"Workers whose activities are tied to the student schedule have been informed that they need not report to work, and their year will be adjusted once the student's year has been adjusted," he said.

Classes for those students could now be on hold for as long as three and a half weeks, if no agreement is reached before a target date soon to be announced by the Pennsylvania Department of Education.

The date, as required by law, would be the latest date by which students could still get 180 days of instructional time before June 15, 2009, while still taking national and local holidays into account.

"At that time, both parties will enter into a mandatory nonbinding arbitration process," Sultanik explained.

In that process, a three-person panel consisting of a neutral arbitrator and ones chosen by the SAEA and school board would hold hearings and take testimony before issuing a set of public recommendations which each party must vote on.

"If either party doesn't accept the recommendations, the teachers union then has the right to strike again," Sultanik said.

"That 'second strike' is typically only about a week in duration, and typically happens around late spring, depending on the schedule in that type of situation," he said.

Lukridge expressed his hope on Tuesday that the process would not get nearly that far.

"The state mediator has the phone numbers of both sides, and said she would get us back together as soon as is feasibly possible," Lukridge said.

"I would hope within this next week that we have another session, but we'll have to go by her schedule," he said.