The teachers’ union and New York City’s Department of Education have yet to reach an agreement on a teacher evaluation deal, and Governor Cuomo has stated that he does not plan to extend the January 17 deadline. According to SchoolBook, negotiations between the teachers’ union and City officials dissolved toward the end of December and have not yet resumed. There are 9 districts across the state, including New York City, who have not yet submitted teacher evaluation plans.
The Department of Education plans to continue trying to reach an agreement with the teachers’ union, but Cuomo has made it clear that the deadline will not be extended:
“It was not a good faith effort by that date, it was accomplishment by that date. It was performance by that date,” Cuo0mo said, sternly. “That’s what the law said. That was the directive from very early on. We didn’t say ‘everybody should try.’ You know, government always tries. The problem with government is sometimes it doesn’t perform. So we didn’t say let’s everybody should try. They’d been trying for years and failing for years.
“This was a hard deadline. If you get it done, great, you get 4 percent additional funding. If you don’t get it done, that’s your business but then you don’t get the 4 percent additional funding.”
