Negotiators for the Shawnee Mission School District and the teachers union are at an impasse and will now present their cases to a neutral party. On one side are teachers who feel overworked and underpaid. On the other side are school administrators who say the union’s demands will ultimately put the district in the red. It’s a dispute with deep roots in the Great Recession and all the years Kansas seriously underfunded schools, happening amidst a national conversation on teacher pay. “We’ve reached a critical point,” said Samantha Feinberg, an English teacher at Shawnee Mission East. “We need the district leadership to know that we can’t do our best for students and for families.” Now what’s known as a “fact finder” is getting involved. Appointed by the Kansas Department of Labor, the fact finder will hear both parties out before making a recommendation.
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