“I wanted people that are teachers to come up here tonight so you could see the people you are dealing with. Sometimes we get caught up with the negotiating team, it’s the negotiating team, but it’s not just the negotiating team: these are the people I’m representing,” said North Bergen Federation of Teachers President Elizabeth Lynch.

Lynch, who said negotiations have been ongoing since November, showed up with at least 150 of her fellow union members for a meeting that took place during the same time as a police promotion ceremony that featured the first Latina captain in the county’s history.

For her efforts, Lynch received a standing ovation for at solid minute as the BOE trustees and Superintendent of Schools Dr. George Solter looked on.

After the meeting, Solter spoke with HCV about the latest contract dispute with the teachers union,

“I have friends that are colleagues, they work for me, I call them colleagues, we have conversations all the time about kids. Conversations all the time about different thoughts … they have to understand and we have to understand them and that’s really where it comes down to.”

The board did not take any action on the teachers contract at Wednesday’s meeting.