Bloomberg Cheers Cuomo's Teacher Evals Despite Increasing Flak from Educators

On the same day that the United Federation of Teachers is unveiling a week's worth of primetime attack ads on Bloomberg, the mayor told Albany that he supports Gov. Andrew Cuomo's budget plan -- including the metrics-minded school proposals that really piss off educators.

In what amounted to a fair amount of Cuomo cheerleading, Bloomberg told lawmakers that he went to Albany today to shout "strong support" for parts of the gov's 2012-2013 budget and reform plan.

After chatting about pensions a bit (the complete text of the speech can be found here), Bloomberg backed Cuomo's call for teacher evals -- and their link to school funding.

"Let's also do what's right for the students who truly are our state's future," he said. "We strongly support his emphasis on teacher evaluation."

And not just to keep federal money, Bloomberg assures.

The very future of the youth "is on the line."

"It's becoming clearer every day that the key to success in education is great teachers. And professional evaluations that go beyond what we have now - 'pass/fail' grades that are not very informative about teacher quality - are an essential tool for assessing and improving that teacher quality. It is really that simple."

Now, Bloomberg wouldn't want you to think that he's singling out or being overly harsh on educators, as some have claimed.

It's just that he really likes the idea of people being told what they're doing wrong.

"Let me remind you that every one of your constituents outside of government lives in a world where they are evaluated constantly, and they've managed to survive doing it. Constant evaluation is good for everyone. It tells you what you are doing wrong so you can fix it, so you can make yourself more effective, so that you can make yourself move valuable," he said.

"Trying to hide behind, 'It's not fair to evaluate people,' is just ridiculous. We do evaluate people all the time, and we have to do it in the most important function the government has - providing an education - so that our kids get the education they need to compete in a world of the future."