EASTSIDE : Azteca Director Has Her Backers

Azteca Head Start teachers and staff who have not been a part of the movement to remove Executive Director Rosanne Ghiazza say there has been an improvement under her tenure.

They are writing letters to Azteca’s board of directors in support of Ghiazza in the hope of countering allegations that she has mismanaged the 14-school program and is unresponsive to parents’ and teachers’ requests to meet with her.

“Before she came on, we never had books, records or tapes,” said Bernice Monroe, who teaches in Maywood. “They used to tell us to go to the (public) library and get that.”

Alice St. Julian, a teacher with Azteca for 28 years, also said Ghiazza has improved the program in the three years she has headed it. “The nicest thing that this director has done for the parents is encourage them to go to school while their children are in the program,” St. Julian said. “They have committee meetings and education and training and all of these are in English and Spanish. It was nothing like it is now.”

Ghiazza has come under fire from some teachers, assistant teachers and parents who claim she has reduced classroom materials, challenged their employment status when they approved membership in the American Federation of Teachers union and withheld some wages in late June.

They have complained to the Los Angeles County Board of Education, which administers funding to local Head Start programs, and Azteca’s board of directors and are circulating petitions for her removal. A meeting of teachers, parents, Azteca board members and representatives from the county has been scheduled for Tuesday.