Teacher Union Officials Controlling New York Education?

In 1970,  George Fischer, then National Education Association (NEA) president, declared, “Within 10 years, I think this organization will control the qualifications for entrance into the profession and for the privilege of remaining in the profession.”  The New York State United Teachers (NYSUT) seems to have achieved that goal in the Empire State.  Teacher union officials managed to pass a law requiring all teachers to either join or automatically become an agency fee payer. Each and every school district contract forces teachers to pay up or be fired.   And now, teacher union officials are blocking efforts made by Governor Andrew Cuomo, to evaluate teachers using test scores.  The New York Post Editorial Board has the story.

‘The single best thing that I can do,” Gov. Cuomo said last year, is “break what is in essence one of the only ­remaining public monopolies”: the teachers union.

Now he’s reportedly set to give up — abandoning the effort to use student scores on state tests to help judge teacher performance. If so, teachers will be judged subjectively, probably by their own peers. Count on every teacher to rank as just peachy — and incompetents to keep on “teaching.”