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Contract Approved for Spoon River College Teachers

Rich Egger

It did not take long to settle a new contract for faculty atSpoon River College.

Administrators and members of the Spoon River College Faculty Associationmet just half-a-dozen times before reaching agreement on a four-year contract.

“It went really well,” said SRC President Curt Oldfield.

Teachers will receive pay raises each year of the pact: 2.75%, 3.0%, 3.10%, and 3.25%.  An additional bump in pay is possible through a student recruitment incentive.

I was excited to see the positive results.

This year’s talks proceeded much more smoothly than a couple years ago. Faculty members filed an intent-to-strike notice in January, 2013 after working without a contact for half the school year.  They eventually agreed to a two-year contract, retroactive to the beginning of that school year.

Oldfield said interest-based bargaining played a major role this time around.

“We had a nice process in terms of being able to implement more of a problem-solving approach. I was excited to see the positive results,” said Oldfield.

In interest-based bargaining, the two sides start talks by finding common ground and then work through their differences.

SRC’s Board of Trustees approved the contract during its July meeting. Faculty members ratified it earlier.

The new contract takes effect August 21, 2014.

Rich is TSPR's News Director.