NEWARK — Gov. Chris Christie's usual punching bags became close allies for today as he hailed a newly approved contract for Newark's teachers.

The governor heaped praise on teacher unions and Democratic officials for fighting hard at the bargaining table and then hammering out a contract that Christie said could touch off "a transformational change in education in America."

Even U.S. Sen. Frank Lautenberg, whom the governor once called "a hack," received a bouquet for his help in responding to Hurricane Sandy.

"This is by far the most gratifying day of my governorship, by far, because the kids of this city deserve better," Christie said at a news conference in a Newark school today. "It’s going to be a really important day for this country."

Under the terms of the contract, Newark’s approximately 4,800 teachers will receive raises and up to $12,500 in bonuses, depending on how well they score on new yearly evaluations — implementing a system known as "merit pay" for the first time in New Jersey.

Christie said Newark Mayor Cory Booker, a potential rival in next year’s governor’s race, was an "indispensable partner."

"Mayor Booker has stood up strongly and eloquently every step along the way," he said.

Randi Weingarten, national president of the American Federation of Teachers, was one of Christie’s most prominent critics last year, when the governor overhauled state pensions and health benefits by shifting more costs to public workers.

But today, Weingarten said both sides had turned a new leaf. And it helped that Christie sought the contract changes through the collective bargaining process, which he sidestepped during the pension battle.

"This is the first day of what could potentially be a huge breakthrough," Weingarten said.

Mark Zuckerberg, the founder of Facebook, chipped in $100 million to help pay for the merit pay bonuses. Newark teachers, who work in the largest and one of the most troubled school districts in New Jersey, approved the contract 62 percent to 38 percent on Wednesday.

The five-year contract applies retroactively to the previous two years and ends in 2015. Teachers will be graded based on standardized test scores, classroom observations and peer assessments, with the best performers getting the biggest raises.

While Christie and others said the agreement should be a template for all the other New Jersey school districts, the rest of the state might not be as receptive as Newark.

The AFT is only affiliated with Newark teachers; the rest of the state’s more than 100,000 teachers are aligned with the New Jersey Education Association, which insists merit pay is discriminatory and a recipe for low morale.

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"I hope that they would look at this as a model," Christie said of the NJEA. "If they don’t, they’ll become dinosaurs, because this is where education in America is moving, and you can either be part of the difference or you can be run over by it."

In a wide-ranging news conference at the Speedway School in Newark, Christie also extended a hand to Lautenberg and U.S. Sen. Robert Menendez — with whom communications have ranged from sporadic to, in the case of Lautenberg, acidic — saying he needed to work with them to rebuild the state after Hurricane Sandy.

"Even if Frank Lautenberg drives me crazy at times, which he does, it doesn’t mean that I don’t understand his importance in the process of helping to rebuild my state and to aid the people who have been so severely damaged by this storm," he said.

The governor also said President Obama’s health-care law — the Affordable Care Act — is now "the law of the land" and that New Jersey would fulfill its requirements.

"We’ve sent about 30 questions to (the Obama administration) to try to gauge the cost factors of the state running this," Christie said. "If they’re willing to answer the questions, and I can evaluate how much it’s going to cost, then I might be inclined to do a state-run exchange. If they’re unwilling to answer the questions for me, then they’re going to run it."

Then Christie — who has been poked and prodded over his weight — was asked to comment on the impending demise of Twinkies, whose maker has facilities in Wayne. But the governor didn't bite.

"I’m on ‘Saturday Night Live’ enough," he said. "You think you’re getting me behind this microphone and having me talk about Twinkies? This is a setup, man, I know it."

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