Case alleging Central Bucks underpaid more than 300 female teachers ends with hung jury

A federal trial featuring claims that the Central Bucks School District discriminated against more than 300 female teachers by paying them less than male colleagues ended in a hung jury Tuesday.

The women — current and former teachers who worked for the district as early as 2000 — said the district treated male teachers more favorably than them. While the women said they were paid less than their years of teaching experience warranted under the district’s salary schedule, they cited examples of male teachers who were credited with their full years of experience, or given credit for experience they didn’t have. The district said the plaintiffs’ comparisons were unfair.

“The district asserted and continues to assert that no employees are compensated or treated differently based on sex or any other factor related to their identity,” district officials said in a message to the community Tuesday.

They noted that with no verdict issued at the end of the trial — which began last week in U.S. District Court in Philadelphia — “the case may be litigated again in the future.”

Becky Cartee-Haring, an English teacher who has been suing the district over unequal pay since 2020, said Tuesday she will continue to pursue the case.

“It’s disappointing. I’m not necessarily disappointed in the jury — there were a lot of very complicated details,” said Cartee-Haring. She said the judge excluded a number of pieces of the plaintiffs’ evidence —including a statistical analysis that Cartee-Haring said found the district’s practices were biased against women — because they weren’t presented to the court early enough.

A juror told Cartee-Haring after the trial that the jury was split 6-2 in the women’s favor, Cartee-Haring said.

“They have a decades-long problem here, and it’s not going away,” she said of the district.

Karen Smith, the president of the Central Bucks school board, said Tuesday that the district would “continue to look at our employment practices and review them going forward.”

“We’re relieved to hear we proved our case to some of the jury,” she said. But “it remains unsettling some of our staff have these concerns about our employment.”

The women had sought $102 million in back pay and damages, along with attorneys fees and an order that the district pay the female teachers at higher rates going forward.

Cartee-Haring said that recently, the women had offered to settle the case for $30 million. They then offered $45 million after discovering additional evidence of two men who were initially placed on the lowest step on the district’s salary scale, but who received pay increases of $13,000 and $19,000 in 2021.

Smith declined to comment on the specifics of settlement negotiations — saying the judge had ordered that those conversations remain confidential. But of the $30 million and $45 million, she said, “one of those numbers is not accurate.”

Smith said her comments were only on behalf of eight board members; the ninth, Rick Haring, is married to Cartee-Haring and has not been a part of board discussions about the case.

On Friday, Cartee-Haring said, she proposed settling by placing 106 current female teachers at higher steps — an increase the district said would cost $2.4 million annually.

That was rejected, said Cartee-Haring, who submitted her resignation that day.

Smith said that was “not an accurate representation.”