JEFFERSON TWP — The teachers strike will continue after another fruitless collective bargaining session on Monday night between the South Butler School Board and its teachers union.

The education association President Ian Babb said no progress was made in the 50-minute negotiation session, during which each side passed communications back and forth via a state mediator.

Babb said the school board rejected a request by the teachers to meet face-to-face with the board members instead of using negotiators in an effort to solve the two sides' differences.

“The SBCEA is willing at all points to meet with the board without legal representation in the hopes of getting back in the classroom,” Babb said.

But school board President Matt Cimbala said meeting without an experienced attorney would be folly.

“This contract is close to $100 million,” Cimbala said. “To ask us to do that without an attorney who knows what he is doing is ridiculous.”

No new bargaining sessions have been scheduled, said the teachers' negotiator Brooke Witt.

She said the district is sticking to its last proposal, which school board members approved in a vote at their March 21 meeting.

Witt said the teachers union gave the district a proposal on March 14 and received no response.

The district's 168 teachers have been on strike since March 15.

Wages and health care coverage continue to be the sticking points in the negotiations.

The teachers must return to the classroom on April 3 so the students will receive the required 180 days of instruction by June 15, as mandated in state Act 88.

Both sides said they were disappointed at Monday night's bargaining session.