Raines v. Independent School District No. 6 of Craig County

796 P.2d 303, 1990 WL 98175

• Court: Supreme Court of Oklahoma
• Decided: July 26, 1990
• Docket: 66036
• Status: Published

Opinions

HODGES, Justice.

This appeal requires resolution of the following question: Does a binding grievance arbitration provision in a collective bargaining agreement between a school board and a teachers’ organization impermissibly delegate the school board’s authority to reprimand a teacher? We answer in the affirmative and reverse the judgment of the trial court.

Appellees in this matter are a school teacher, Marilyn Dixon, and her bargaining agent, the Professional Educators Association of Ketchum (PEAK). Appellants are the Ketchum School Board (Board), its individual members and its superintendent.

The dispute centers around a binding grievance arbitration provision in a collective bargaining agreement between the Board and its teachers. Binding arbitration is the last step in the four-stage teacher grievance procedure. In the first three stages the grievant attempts to resolve the grievance with a school administrator, the superintendent and the Board.

Dixon’s grievance resulted when she was reprimanded by the school superintendent and a copy of the reprimand was placed in her personnel file. Unsatisfied with the result in the first three stages of the grievance procedure, Dixon filed a request for arbitration. The Board refused to participate in the final stage unless the arbitrator’s decision would be advisory only. Dixon and PEAK obtained a writ of mandamus from the district court compelling the Board to submit to binding arbitration. The trial court rejected the argument that the arbitration provision impermissibly delegated the Board’s authority.

The recent decision in Mindemann v. Independent School District No. 6, 771 P.2d 996 (Okla.1989), resolves this controversy. Mindemann recognized two major limitations on a school board’s ability to include certain terms in a collective bargaining agreement. First, a school board’s managerial prerogative cannot be bargained away. Id. at 1002. Second, a school board may not “negotiate a term in a collective bargaining agreement which involves the delegation of a statutory duty or the surrender of discretion vested in the board by statute.” Id. at 1000. In Minde-mann both limitations prevented binding arbitration of a school board’s decision not to reemploy a probationary teacher and its decision to discontinue a teacher’s extra-duty coaching assignment. Id. at 1001-02. Both limitations also prevent a school board from delegating its authority to reprimand a teacher.

The authority to discipline an employee lies at the heart of the managerial prerogative. To subject disciplinary decisions to binding arbitration would seriously interfere with a school board’s ability to maintain adequate standards and discipline among its teachers. Management decisions would be placed in the hands of non-elected arbitrators rather than principals and superintendents who are supervised by an elected school board.

Further, under title 70, sections 6-103 through 6-103.4, the power to admonish, suspend, dismiss or not reemploy a teacher is vested in a school board or an administrator under the board’s supervision. A school board’s abdication of these responsibilities, by its agreement to submit these decisions to binding arbitration, is repugnant to the statutory policy implicit in those sections. See Mindemann, 771 P.2d at 1002.

The authority to discipline a teacher is nondelegable and not bargainable. The trial court erred in requiring the Board to comply with the binding arbitration provision. The decision of the trial court is REVERSED.

HARGRAVE, C.J., OPALA, V.C.J., and LAVENDER and SIMMS, JJ., concur. DOOLIN, ALMA WILSON, KAUGER and SUMMERS, JJ., dissent.