Schools Chancellor Dennis Walcott said yesterday for the first time he’s “supportive” of compromise talks in Albany that would provide teacher ratings to parents, but not necessarily to the public at large.
Assembly Speaker Shelly Silver (D-Manhattan) said last week he’s eyeing a measure that would give parents access to teacher performance ratings — but otherwise keep them private like the evaluations of police and fire-department personnel.
“Parents should be the key recipient of the data,” Walcott told The Post in an interview at Tweed Courthouse covering his first year as chancellor. “If that’s the type of discussion that’s taking place . . . I would be supportive of that.”
Three New York courts ruled in the past year that the city Department of Education was obliged to provide The Post and other media outlets with the ratings of more than 12,000 teachers by name. The rankings were published last month to varied reception, with many parents hailing the transparency and others worrying about data inaccuracies and teacher morale.
With new evaluations set to launch statewide in the next school year, some lawmakers are arguing for restrictions on how the data is shared.
After nearly a year as chancellor and with 21 months until his term’s likely end, Walcott said his to-do list includes hammering out the new evaluation system with the teachers union by September.
That would be months ahead of a mid-January deadline set by Gov. Cuomo for districts to reach a deal or lose out on an earmarked increase in school aid.
Walcott also said the administration plans to leave students with 1,800 school options by next December — a nearly 50 percent boost from the roughly 1,200 schools that existed when Mayor Bloomberg’s first term started in 2002.
The Department of Education is also wrapping up a review of all of its contracts in a bid to identify savings that can be passed on to schools — something critics have been demanding for years.
“We’re at the final stages of that analysis now,” said Walcott.
Meanwhile, the chancellor he abruptly replaced — former Hearst magazines honcho Cathie Black — is working as a consultant and gearing up to chair an inaugural “Women in Leadership” conference in West Virginia later this month, according to sources.
Homemaking mogul Martha Stewart will keynote the Greenbrier Resort event in White Sulpher Springs, W.Va.
“I miss the kids, I miss the teachers, I miss the principals — but Dennis Walcott’s doing a great job,” Black, who lasted less than 100 days as a gaffe-prone chancellor, told The Post outside her Manhattan apartment building.
She suggested that getting the hook from Bloomberg after her mismatched appointment hasn’t soured their relationship — and that they have plans for dinner in a couple of weeks.
“I see him all the time,” she said.
Even though Walcott annually rates schools, principals and teachers, he declined to give himself a performance rating when asked.
“That’s for others to decide,” he said.
According to his boss, he deserves an A-plus for his first year’s performance.
“It is a very difficult job, and Dennis is doing a great job,” said Bloomberg.
Additional reporting by David Seifman