Teachers

Negotiations between the Willingboro school board and the union representing the district's 596 striking teachers and secretaries will resume Monday evening at an undisclosed location, officials said yesterday. If the bargaining does not lead to a settlement, district officials said, substitute teachers and administrators will be brought in to teach Willingboro's 6,400 students next week. If the strike continues, district officials said they will also ask Burlington County Superior Court Judge Myron Gottlieb to hold the teachers in contempt of court.

Teachers from Gloucester City's six public schools plan to demonstrate at the June 13 Board of Education meeting, hoping to pick up the pace of labor negotiations before their current contract expires on June 30. Pat Ragen, chairman of the Gloucester City Education Association's negotiating team, said the city's 150 teachers wanted a new contract before the old one expired. If a contract is not negotiated soon, teachers will not go back to work in September, she said. "We're not happy at all with the pace of negotiations," Ragen said.

Teachers in Norristown will resume their strike Monday unless an agreement is reached in their bargaining impasse with the school district, union representatives said yesterday. The 435 teachers, who voluntarily returned to work Sept. 29 after a three- week strike, overwhelmingly rejected a fact-finding report last week that recommended salary increases of 9.8 percent for each year in a four-year contract, for a total of 39 percent. "That's unacceptable to us," said Eve Epstein, president of the Norristown Area Education Association.

'If the press were not so biased against the teachers and the [Philadelphia Federation of Teachers] and would allow our side to be printed, then maybe we could get more support - through knowledge and understanding of the facts - to help us do our jobs better. " That comment from a veteran teacher was one of many hopeful, angry and desperate pleas for attention I discovered Monday reading responses to the Daily News Teacher Survey. Some 900 of the city's 12,000 teachers returned the surveys - a surprisingly high response rate.

About 35 members of the Stratford teachers' union appeared at a school board meeting last night to protest the treatment of district Superintendent Gene Iannetti by several board members. "A dedicated, conscientious administration has been demeaned, with the effect of demoralizing the whole staff," union representative Nancy Riti said in a public statement to the board. "The harmony has been shattered. " Neither Iannetti nor any of the board members responded. Iannetti has been the center of a struggle between several members of the board and the district administration.

The Bensalem Township school board decided on Tuesday to establish an academy where its teachers could take graduate-level courses, but only for a probationary period of one year. Assistant Superintendent David Archibald, who serves on the staff development committee that proposed the academy in August 1988, said the probationary period would allay the board's concerns over the financial impact the Bensalem Academy for Professional Development would have. Archibald said he expected the administration to come back to the board in December with a request to run the first academy course early next year.

The vote was called overwhelming as members of the Octorara Area Education Association once again gave their leaders the OK to strike, if necessary. Although both sides hope there won't be the need for another strike like the 20-day one last fall, union president Donna Lee Edwards thinks that nearly 16 months without a contract is enough and that it's time for the 150 teachers in the Octorara Area School District to have a contract. On Tuesday, the teachers gave what Edwards called overwhelming support to authorize a strike, although they did not set a strike date.

Teachers in the West Chester Area School District will be required to give students written outlines of their courses under new guidelines adopted this week by the school board. Under the "teacher/course expectation procedure," scheduled to begin in September, instructors must prepare written outlines that include information about content, grading, makeup work and behavior. The outlines are to be given to students at the beginning of their courses. According to Patricia Dixon, the district's director of curriculum, instruction and staff development, the procedure will be ready at all levels Sept.

Edith Bauer was supposed to be picking up her new car this week, but the shiny blue Mazda is still on the dealer's lot because Bauer is walking the picket line. A Garnet Valley Junior and Senior High math teacher since 1970, Bauer is one of Garnet Valley School District's 110 teachers who didn't report to their classrooms Tuesday. Instead, the teachers unanimously agreed to strike, Bauer said, until there is a new contract to replace the one that expired on June 30. "I love teaching; I love my students, and I miss it very much," said Bauer as she did picket duty yesterday.