Gov. Andrew Cuomo for the first time Tuesday questioned whether school districts should evaluate their teachers through tough new standards known as the Common Core.
The governor, who had previously fought off attempts to eliminate or water down the evaluations, said there’s a problem with scoring teachers based on the results of Common Core exams being administered to their students.
While the exams are still being given this week, the results won’t be counted in student assessments for the next two years as part of a compromise with critics who say there wasn’t enough time to prepare for the revised curriculum.
“If you said Common Core testing was premature for students and you just halted the grades on the transcript, then what is your opinion about the impact of Common Core testing on teachers’ evaluations and what should be done?” the governor said after signing the new state budget in Albany.
“We need to address it before the end of session.”
Cuomo made his remarks one day after Westchester County Executive Rob Astorino, who is running for governor on the GOP line, announced that two of his kids will be opting out of the Common Core exams.
“What [Cuomo] said today was patronizing to the parents — that everyone can exhale because the tests won’t count,” Astorino said in response to the governor’s comments.
Cuomo has made rigorous curriculum standards and teacher evaluations a central part of his education platform.
Last year, when the Bloomberg administration and the teachers union couldn’t reach agreement on an evaluation system, Cuomo imposed one.
He also pushed the Board of Regents to reverse a proposal allowing educators to use their districts’ slow implementation of Common Core as an excuse for poor ratings.
“There is a difference between remedying the system for students and parents and using this situation as yet another excuse to stop the teacher evaluation process,” Cuomo said last month.
Education reform advocates were puzzled by Cuomo’s latest position.
“A teacher evaluation system is his signature education accomplishment and I can’t imagine that he would move toward dismantling a reform he fought so hard for,” said Campbell Brown, founder of the Parents Transparency Project.
But union leaders welcomed the governor’s plan for reviewing the system.
“It’s the Common Core versus common sense,” said Michael Mulgrew, president of the United Federation of Teachers.