MFT Contract Negotiation April 30, 2007 - NOTES

The meeting was facilitated by Levai Babaya, a mediator from the State of Minnesota Bureau of Mediation Services (BMS).  A listing of the negotiation teams was completed at the start of the meeting. However, not all of the people listed were present.  Emma and Rob were identified as the chief negotiators.

My presence created a minor stir at the beginning of the meeting, there were obvious side conversations about my presence, and as the meeting started, the facilitator pulled me aside and asked me about how I wound up there.  Much of the meeting covered ground rules of the negotiations, and at the point where outside observers were discussed, I was invited to stand up and introduce myself to the rest of group present.

The group confirmed the schedule for future discussions, each meeting scheduled for two hours and taking place in the MFT boardroom.

The group spent some time discussing how the progress of the negotiations would be communicated to others.  Apparently, the suggestion had been previously raised that news about the negotiations would be communicated through joint MFT/MPS statements.  It was discussed that in previous negotiations, MFT had issued updates entitled "The Negotiator", which delivered unilateral assessments of the negotiation process to the MFT membership.  It was decided that a team of two MFT representative and two MPS representatives would construct joint informational releases during this session, although these releases would not necessarily occur after each session.  The committee also agreed that any contact with the press would be through the chief negotiators, and that other members of the negotiation teams should not talk directly to the press.

The topic that took the most discussion time was about how the negotiation committee would use sub-committees and how special interests or outside experts would communicate with the committee.  [This discussion went in circles a bit, so I'm not positive about all of the resulting details.  The general theme seemed to be that subcommittees of the negotiating teams would be formed around specific issues, and that these subcommittees could include people who were not on the negotiating team.  It seemed a general preference that the subcommittees have the goal of informing the negotiation committee's discussion of particular issues, but that these subcommittees should not introduce new issues to the negotiation process.] 

The BMS mediator reviewed the fact that these negotiation were open meetings, and that outside observers were allowed to attend.  There was a discussion about how outside observers should be handled, and it was proposed that outside observers request permission to attend from the chief negotiators.  Emma spoke up and offered the opinion that requiring such permission was probably contrary to open meeting law, so it was decided that visitors would be requested to notify the chief negotiators of their plans to observe.  It was also decided that observers would be invited to introduce themselves at the start of the session, and that their names would be recorded in the meeting minutes.  And it was noted that outside observers could not participate in the discussion.

It was discussed that the negotiation process would focus on ISSUES one at a time.  It was the agreement of both parties that all of the ISSUES would be identified early in the negotiation process, and that there would be a cut-off date for identifying ISSUES that the negotiations would cover.  The cut-off date was identified as two meetings beyond this meeting.

MFT and MPS were invited to list their ISSUES.  Rob hesitated to start the listing, so Emma listed the district's ISSUES, and Rob followed.  Rob noted several times that his list was not complete, and that more ISSUES would be identified in future meetings.  Emma seemed confident that she outlined all of the districts ISSUES. All of the ISSUES identified by MFT and MPS were combined into one list.

ISSUES identified by MPS:
* Teacher transfer and lay-off
* Professional / staff development
* Alternative compensation
* Salary and benefits
* Technology
...and minor "housekeeping" topics.

ISSUES identified by MFT:
* Realignment
* Fresh Starts
* Quality / amount of teaching
* Technology training
* Technology support
* District initiatives
* Time
* Staff development
* Facilities / work environment
* K-5 report cards

After the ISSUES were listed, the mediator invited people to start talking about what each ISSUE meant, one by one.  However, by this point, there was less than ten minutes left in the meeting time, so someone at the table suggested that the meaning of each issue should be explored during the next meeting.  There was general agreement with this suggestion, and the mediator assigned all of the negotiating committee the homework of thinking about what each ISSUE meant and why it was an ISSUE.  The meeting ended with each member of the negotiating group offering a one-word assessment of the meeting.