Striking Middletown teachers agreed to return to work Monday 10 December, ending the walkout that put more than 200 of them in jail last week.
Judge Fisher ordered the release of all teachers and secretaries.
The MTEA and the school Board will now enter nonbinding mediation.Judge Clarkson S. Fisher Jr. began sending teachers and secretaries to jail Monday, Dec. 3 in an effort to persuade them to end their strike. He had issued a back-to-work order shortly after the walkout began Nov. 29. By the end of Thursday, the number of teachers behind bars had reached 228, or about a quarter of the staff.
The teachers were called before judges in alphabetical order, starting with the A’s on Monday. By Thursday, three judges were working on the case and they had reached the R’s.
Many of the teachers made impassioned speeches about willingness to suffer the consequences of their defiance, their love of the job, and their contempt for Board of Education leaders.
"I try to teach my students this country is fair and just," teacher Barbara Guenther, 57, told Superior Court Judge Ira Kreizman this week, her voice breaking. "In this process, the law is not fair and just. Sometimes, good people have to stand up to fight an unjust law, and that’s what I’m doing."
