Opinion ID: 2288016
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 11

Heading: Length of a Teacher's Working Day

Text: Similarly, the length of the school day in terms of the number of hours the teacher will be required to teach or be in attendance at school, is a matter concerning which the working conditions interests of teachers are fundamentally inseparable from a plurality of non-teacher considerations involving important managerial and policy areas. While it is clear that the number of hours which any individual teacher shall be required to work in a given day need not coincide with the number of hours the students are obliged to be in attendance at school, this fact by itself fails to establish that the length of the teacher's school day may be isolated as a proper subject of mandatory collective bargaining. Closer scrutiny reveals that were the length of the teacher's school day negotiable in collective bargaining and in a given situation were economic conditions to preclude the hiring of additional teaching personnel, negotiations aimed at shortening the work-day of teachers would necessarily become directed toward seeking alternatives to the hiring of additional personnel. There would thus eventuate an exploration into such areas as the utilization of newer educational techniques by which a teacher's actual presence or participation is rendered unnecessary  e. g., electronic aids, open class rooms, team teaching programs and subject-matter restrictions or modifications. In this manner, significantly more substantial intrusions into policy areas,  over and above encroachment simply upon the managerial supervision, organization, direction and distribution of personnel  become involved. Thus, the length of the teacher's working day is closely and heavily interwoven with judgments bearing upon the welfare of the students,  as reflected in the ultimate quality of their education and the extent to which it may be improved or weakened by use of various types of substitutes, technological or otherwise, for the living presence and active participation of teachers. Such foundational educational value judgments cannot reasonably be subordinated to the overlay of teacher working conditions, and for this reason, the length of the teacher's working day must be held, fundamentally, that kind of educational policies subject-matter which was legislatively intended to remain outside the scope of mandatory collective bargaining and, therefore, of binding arbitration. The arbitrators exceeded their jurisdiction in making binding determinations concerning the length of the teacher working day.