South Butler teachers picket in March at Knoch High School. Classes resumed Tuesday as mandated by the state Department of Education so students can reach the necessary 180 days by June 15.

South Butler School District teachers return to school Tuesday with mixed emotions, according to a union representative.

Teachers' union President Ian Babb said members are looking forward to returning to work, but the lack of a contract with the school district is still a problem.

“We're obviously excited,” Babb said. “We're happy to get back into the classroom.”

The state Department of Education mandated that the district's 168 teachers end their strike so students can log their 180 days of school by June 15.

Babb said the issues that led to the strike have not gone away. He said teachers want to continue meeting with the school board to work on the issues that ignited the strike, which began on March 15. The school board and teachers have not had a meeting since March 26.

Babb said teachers believe the issues could be resolved without arbitration.

“We want to meet with the school board to work on the issues,” Babb said. “The board seems pretty focused on preparing for non-binding arbitration rather than working with us.”

According to state Act 88, both sides will give a final, best offer to a three-person arbitration panel, which is composed of people representing both sides and one neutral party. The hearing will involve both sides' arguments and third-party fact finders.

Then, the panel will move issue by issue, selecting the best options to determine a contract. The contract will be automatically accepted unless either side votes to reject the decision.

Tom Breth, the school board's solicitor and negotiator, said the board was trying to work with the teachers to find common ground, but it wasn't working.

“The board members and teachers have spoken in side bars and side sessions for about 25 hours (total),” Breth said. “None of those discussions have been productive.”

Breth said the school board has fielded proposals from the teachers, but the board continues to ask for the teachers' best offer.

“If the teachers want to approve something and send it to the board to vote on, this could be resolved,” Breth said. “They didn't give the board their best offer.”

Brooke Witt, Uniserv negotiator for the teachers union, said many teachers are disappointed in having to go into arbitration, but none are surprised. It is South Butler's fifth strike since 1978.

“We will begin the process to request nonbinding arbitration this week,” Witt said. “Hopefully that will provide us with a resolution that we have not been able to reach on our own.”

Breth said the school district is also preparing for the arbitration.

“We think that's the best hope of getting this resolved,” he said.

In the meantime, he said administrators are glad to have teachers and students back in the classrooms.

“They're happy to have the teachers back in classrooms where they belong,” Breth said. “We hope that the students, teachers, parents and administrators can get back to not strike issues but education issues.”

The 168 teachers in the district have been working without a contract since June 30, 2014.

Multiple calls to Superintendent David Foley on Monday were not returned.