About that Tuesday morning workshop to discuss a new culinary arts academy at Land O'Lakes High. Forget it.

The Pasco School Board instead has called a closed-door session to discuss bargaining strategy for matters related to the Race to the Top. Things like differential pay and performance pay that the feds say they want to see if districts are to qualify for a piece of the $4.3-billion pie.

That's all well and good, United School Employees of Pasco president Lynne Webb told the Gradebook.

"They know the Race to the Top is coming up. They know it has bargaining implications. They know they need the union to be a partner in the process if they want to have any credibility in the application process," Webb said.

Still, she added, it would have been nice to get some advance word that the district wants to go back to the table. The USEP has not received a letter requesting to bargain.

"I would think it's a little strange that they would have an executive session before we've even had the slightest conversation," Webb said.

School Board lawyer Dennis Alfonso said he has advised the administration and staff that he will have little tolerance for a wide ranging discussion, and that any executive session has to deal specifically with the potential contractual impacts that the federal initiative might have.

"They can't circumvent the sunshine by calling an executive session just to distribute information to the board," Alfonso said. "But if it's something that will lead to impact bargaining, I'm okay with that."

The workshop on the culinary arts academy, for those of you who are interested, has been rescheduled for Dec. 15.