312.332.7760 (tel.)
312.332.7768 (fax)
flifton@rsnlt.com

Practice Areas: The Workplace, Education, Local Governments

Fred Lifton's practice focuses on all aspects of labor relations and employment law, and in many areas of education law. In more than 50 years of practice, Fred has represented public bodies (especially colleges and school districts) and school and college employees in regard to personnel, employment agreements, grievances, mediation, open meetings, freedom of information and many other workplace and school district issues. He is a recognized national authority on educational collective bargaining and has negotiated over 950 school and college contracts in Illinois, Iowa, Florida and Louisiana, and has conducted training seminars in almost every state in the nation. His experience also includes more than 50 instances of mutual gains bargaining, plus frequent service as an advocate in grievance and interest arbitrations. He is one of the few persons named as a Distinguished Professor by the National Academy of School Executives. Fred has also been appointed as a Teacher Discipline Hearing Officer by the State Board of Education. He recently served two terms as a member of the Highland Park Telecommunications Commission. For ten years, Fred was a member of the elementary and high school boards and several Village of Skokie boards and commissions.

Fred currently serves as an arbitrator in the Circuit Courts of Cook and Lake Counties. He also serves as a hearing officer for student expulsion and truancy matters, and is an arbitrator on the roster of FINRA (Financial Industry Regulatory Authority). Fred is a former Chair of the School Law Section of the Illinois State Bar Association. He has served as Legal Advisor to AASA, a Member of the Labor Arbitration Panels of the American Arbitration Association and Michigan Employment Relations Commission and as an arbitrator for the Better Business Bureau. He is a former Negotiations Consultant to the National School Board Association and instrumental in the formation of its Council of School Attorneys.

The John Marshall Law School in Chicago appointed Fred to its adjunct faculty in 2004, to teach a course on Labor Law, which he has done each semester since that time.

Law & Politics Magazine selected Fred as a 2005 Illinois "Super Lawyer" in the specialized area of School and Education Law. Chicago Magazine published the names of the Illinois Super Lawyers in its May 2005 issue. Additionally, in 2004, Fred was named a "Leading Lawyer" by the Law Bulletin Publishing Company for being recognized in a survey of his peers as being in the top 5 percent of Illinois attorneys. He is also listed on LeadingLawyers.com.

Education

• J.D., with high distinction, Wayne State University Law School, Valedictorian, 1951
• A.B., Wayne State University, 1949

Admitted to Practice

• U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois
• Supreme Court of Illinois
• Supreme Court of Michigan (currently inactive)

Recent Publications

• Contributing author, "Seven Good Reasons for Confidential Bargaining," Illinois School Boards Journal (May/June 2007)
• Contributing author, "Labor Relations: Contract Administration Including ULPs," ILLINOIS SCHOOL LAW (IICLE, 2005)
• Co-author, "Performance Pay for Teachers," IIT Chicago-Kent Law Review (April 2001)
• Co-author, "New Approaches to Compensation for Teachers," The Illinois Public Employee Relations Report, Vol. 18, No. 1 (Winter 2001)
• Contributing author, "Labor Relations," ILLINOIS SCHOOL LAW (IICLE, 1999, Supp. 2001)

Recent Presentations

• Costing Collective Bargaining Proposals, Illinois Association of School Business Officials (Apr. 2002).