Nebraska teachers negotiate wages, benefits and working conditions with the school board through their local teachers union. If the two sides cannot come to an agreement, then a mediator can be brought in to try and assist with the negotiations process. If mediation fails, the dispute will be settled by the Commission of Industrial Relations.
The Commission of Industrial Relations (CIR) is an administrative agency set up by the Nebraska Legislature to settle wage and working condition disputes between Nebraska governmental agencies (including school districts) and their employees. The CIR can set wages, benefits, hours and other conditions of employment.
It is illegal for Nebraska teachers to go on strike, so in a "trade-off" the legislature has provided the CIR as a mechanism to settle wage and salary disputes.
How does the CIR decide what a school district must provide its employees?
To determine wages and benefits of employment, the CIR must take into consideration the overall compensation being received by employees (wages and benefits).
Overall compensation provided by a school district must be comparable to the prevalent compensation and conditions of employment provided to employees at similar school districts. The CIR will have an "array" of similar schools to compare to the school district in dispute. This array is established by the closest nearby schools that are similar in size and working conditions. The array for Bancroft-Rosalie would most likely include Lyons-Decatur, Oakland-Craig, Wisner-Pilger, Howells-Dodge, Wakefield, Pender, Emerson-Hubbard, Homer, but probably not West Point-Beemer (more than twice as many students) or Walthill, Omaha Nation or Winnebago (not similar working conditions).
The CIR would look at what each teacher at our school would receive in total compensation at each of the schools in the array. When all of the calculations are completed, the Bancroft-Rosalie teachers total compensation must be within 98-102% of the average compensation provided by the array schools. If it is not, then the salary will be set by the CIR so that the school district is in that range.
If school boards negotiate to reduce the insurance benefits provided to teachers, then they must increase the teachers salaries to make up for it. Reducing benefits provided will not reduce the total cost to the school district. The total cost must be comparable to what teachers would be provided at neighboring schools.
