A state supreme court judge issued a temporary injunction today preventing state officials from cutting $250 million from the city Department Of Education budget for the current school year as punishment for the lack of a teacher evaluation system.
Governor Andrew Cuomo originally said that the city DOE lost the funding for failing to reach an agreement with the United Federation of Teachers on evaluations by January 17.
City officials argued that removing the money would hurt students.
Civil Court Judge Miguel Mendez granted a preliminary injunction, saying the city has shown cause that students and vital programs will be harmed.
There is no word on when a hearing on the matter will take.
It is also not known whether the state will appeal the ruling.
The State Education Department refused to comment on the ruling.
The UFT has not released a statement yet but is reviewing the ruling.
This ruling comes a day after the Cuomo administration announced that the state education commissioner will set a new teacher evaluation system for city public school educators by June 1, if city officials and the teachers union cannot reach an agreement by then.
Cuomo wants to introduce a state budget amendment bill that will give the state education commissioner the perpetual power to step in and impose a teacher evaluation system on the city.
The governor said the school could risk losing another $250 million if the city DOE does not have an evaluation system in place by September.
Cuomo doesn't like to lose to Bloomberg.
Also, this sets a legal precedent that aid increases cannot be tied to something like an evaluation agreement if losing that aid would punish students.
I'm going to wager that the state appeals this ruling.
As I said, Cuomo doesn't like to lose to Bloomberg and in this ruling, he lost to Bloomberg.
I am also going to wager that Cuomo's budget amendment bill that gives the NYSED the power to impose a teacher evaluation system onto NYC ad infinitum can be challenged in court too.
A one year budget amendment that puts in place a rule that allows the NYSED the power to impose an evaluation system onto NYC- and only NYC - should be challenged.
Since using the students as hostages and punishing students is illegal, the evaluation system has not gone through a real negotiation process. Therefore, any evaluation agreement put forward by Cuomo or King is not eligible for Race to the Top money at least according to the rules of the Race to the Top fiat. That is just a logical consequence of the judges ruling. Also, the evaluation system is nothing more than a scheme since it is without sound scientific or empirical basis. Its methodology is logically problematic. It can be, and should be knocked down in court. So why are the assholes Mulgrew, Bloomberg, Cuomo and King so deeply engaged in this scheme. Straight answer: They want to take away teacher benefits, pension and job security and use the money to privatize public schools into non-union charter schools. This is a scheme to enrich their crony friends in the corporate world of education technology< Murdoch , Pearson.....and charter school entrepreneurs.
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