The Bloomberg administration's failure to reach an agreement with the New York City teachers' union on the details of a state-mandated teacher evaluation system by the Thursday deadline has cost the city hundreds of millions of dollars in state money. The State Education Department notified the city on Friday that it would face even harsher penalties if it failed to promptly establish a timeline and budget for complying with the law.
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Under a 2010 state law, which was passed by the Legislature in a bid to win nearly $700 million in competitive grants from the federal government's Race to the Top program, the state was required to create a new teacher evaluation system. The old system, which everyone agreed was terrible, relied on spotty observations by administrators and found an overwhelming majority of teachers "satisfactory" whether or not they were performing in the job.
The new system rates teachers as "highly effective," "effective," "developing" or "ineffective." Those rated as "ineffective" for two consecutive years can be dismissed through an expedited process. The state law requires that 60 percent of a teacher's score be based on subjective measures like classroom observation and 20 percent based on students' academic improvement on state tests. Another 20 percent is to be based on locally approved measures of student achievement, to be decided with the union.
According to the State Education Department, 99 percent of the state's nearly 700 school districts managed to negotiate new evaluation systems by the Thursday deadline, thus avoiding sanctions that could lead to a loss of state aid. New York City, by contrast, mounted a disastrous negotiation process that failed at the 11th hour, leading to the loss of $240 million in state aid and endangering more than $250 million in federal grants.
The city blames the union, asserting that the union wanted a two-year "sunset" provision that would render the evaluation provision inoperative in 2015, making it extremely difficult to dismiss ineffective teachers. The union disputes this interpretation, countering that Mayor Bloomberg simply blew up the deal when his negotiators came to him with an agreement he did not like. In any case, the sunset provision should not be an obstacle. According to state estimates, 90 percent of the evaluation systems in the state have similar provisions, which would allow local officials to revisit the newly developed evaluation systems and dismissal policies to make sure that they are fair and working as planned.
The state education commissioner, John King Jr., was not persuaded by the city's argument and expressed disappointment that the negotiations broke off over what he described as minor disagreements. He noted in a letter on Friday to the New York City schools chancellor, Dennis Walcott, that the city would lose more state aid if it failed to make clear progress on the evaluation system very soon. If the city fails to comply, the state will refuse to approve city spending plans for about $1 billion in federal education aid — and might even take the unusual step of redirecting a portion of the money for other purposes.
To avoid that disastrous outcome, Mr. Bloomberg and the union will need to return to the bargaining table and get this deal done as quickly as possible. If the two sides fail to arrive at an agreement very soon, the state should continue turning up the pressure on every front, to make sure that the city complies with the law and that its schoolchildren get the credible teacher evaluation systems they clearly need.
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