Charting Her Own Path in Education : Profile: Principal Yvonne Chan is dynamic and savvy. She puts those qualities to work for students at the Vaughn charter school.

To those who know her, it was classic Yvonne Chan.

Down the street from the school she headed in Sylmar, police had just completed what was then one of the largest drug busts in history: 21.4 tons of cocaine valued at more than $6 billion.

But while authorities seized the contraband, it was Chan who seized the day, organizing a community rally to keep her students off drugs, a rally attended by students, parents, school officials, politicians--and plenty of media types.

The event was emblematic of the woman who now directs the San Fernando Valley’s first charter school, the Vaughn Next Century Learning Center, as it charts new territory in education reform in California.

Friends and colleagues recognize her as a driven, dynamic, highly intelligent and media-savvy principal who fights tirelessly for her school, willing to use anything at her disposal to advance the cause of her students. She attacks challenges head-on, finding ways to parlay negatives into positives.

And mixed into it all is a dose of self-promotion that springs from a keen sense of competition and a fierce streak of pride that has marked her life since she emigrated from Hong Kong alone, as a teen-ager, 30 years ago.

“I’m a very competitive person--extremely so,” she said. “Not in the sense of trying to make other people look bad, but I need my school to shine, I need my team to shine. I love a sense of pride, I love the challenge of being able to maneuver without hurting people, and I believe in survival of the fittest.”

Those qualities were on display recently during a funding dispute between Vaughn and the Los Angeles Unified School District. The disagreement has still not been resolved, although the district has offered a compromise and Chan has characteristically enlisted the aid of politicians, community leaders and the media to secure what she contends the school is due.

At issue is the amount of money schools receive from the district for each pupil. Chan has asked for $3,100 for each of her students, while the district has countered at $2,540.

She was privately criticized by some who thought she had gone too far in trying to win more for Vaughn than its fair share. But Chan, 49, is unrepentant.

“I do have to say that sometimes I get carried away,” she said. “(But) I have to do this. It’s my school. When the battle lines are drawn, I know which side I’m on.”

For the most part her colleagues praise her as an indefatigable innovator, a computer whiz with a knack for languages (English, Spanish, French and a few Chinese dialects) and grant-writing (Vaughn Street has received hundreds of thousands of dollars in donations). Her peers are also grateful for her willingness to share her expertise, although she does not tend to be active or particularly outspoken in various organized groups.

“Unfortunately, there’s not a lot of emulation by administrators--not a whole lot of people say, ‘I want to be like Yvonne,’ ” said Patricia Abney, principal at Hazeltine Avenue School in Van Nuys. “But by the same token, a lot of people call her and say, ‘How did you handle such and such?’ or ‘What was your cover letter like?’ She shares information instantly.”

The eagerness to share stems in large part from Chan’s desire that Vaughn be viewed as a success and a model for other schools that want to reform and lead the way in educational change.

Already she is credited with transforming Vaughn from a dysfunctional school with the worst test scores in the district into a campus widely cited for its strides in bringing social services to mostly indigent children and their parents. Academic achievement of the school’s overwhelmingly minority student body has improved, though not in all areas. The school’s move to charter status was largely spearheaded by Chan and a small corps of teachers.

District officials placed her at Vaughn after watching her tackle a tough assignment at Sylmar School, where outraged parents and teachers had protested the transfer of her predecessor. Chan disarmed them by meeting the most vocal of the lot, responding to their requests, putting fresh flowers in classrooms and insisting that everyone pull together for the sake of the children.

“I’m damn serious about meeting the kids’ needs,” she said. “I know what I need to run a good school.”

When she moved to Vaughn in May, 1990, she brought the same high energy level--and the same media savvy that had been so successful at Sylmar, particularly with the anti-drug rally the year before.

Vaughn has been in the news numerous times since Chan’s arrival. Principal and school were the subject of a recent public television news show spotlighting Vaughn’s reforms. And the current funding battle has been waged as much in the newspapers as in school offices and boardrooms.

Chan is adept at maneuvering in the public eye, and she understands what makes a good photo op or a good sound bite.

“I’m a pretty good show biz person,” she said.

“She’s quotable, she’s intelligent,” said Assistant Supt. Sara A. Coughlin, who oversees elementary schools in the Valley and has worked with Chan for five years. “She’s an incredibly talented human being, and what she’s done (at Vaughn) is very attractive. . . .

“There are times when I wish she’d share the glory with others, and we’ve talked about that. Is there some jealousy for the spotlight she’s in? Yes. There are some schools that feel, ‘Hey, wait a minute--we’re doing good things, too, and why aren’t we getting the attention that Vaughn gets?’ ”

Others applaud Chan for using all available outlets to advance Vaughn’s agenda.

“Because she is so outstanding and because she is off the norm, she gets a lot of garbage,” said former Los Angeles school board member Roberta Weintraub, who represented the East Valley for more than a decade. “There’s a lot of anger and a lot of jealousy because she outshines everybody.

“But good for her to use her talents to have good things happen for her school. It’s beneficial for her, her kids and the whole school community that something like this can be successful.”

Chan’s career in education began almost by accident. She immigrated to the United States, determined to get a good education and make her way in the world. After arriving in California on her 18th birthday with less than $100 in her pocket and a basket of herbs to sell, she worked her way through college, intending to go into the diplomatic corps or even the CIA.

But a dearth of jobs sent her to a private school as a teacher until she moved to public schools several years later. She now holds a doctorate in education from UCLA.

School district officials have broached the idea of higher-level administration jobs for Chan. But she prefers to remain on the elementary school level and on campus rather than being closeted in an office. And although she enjoys much of the limelight lavished on her school, she says she cannot let it distract her from her ultimate goal.

“I have to be very careful about that. I like all the enthusiasm and all the romanticism and the spotlight, but there are times I have to think of what this is all about,” said Chan, who is married and has two grown sons. “This is about running a public school I believe in, that is worth saving.”

YVONNE CHAN

Age: 49

Residence: Northridge

Education: B.A. in French, UCLA, 1968; M.A. in special education, Cal State Northridge, 1976; education doctorate, UCLA, 1980; post-doctoral work in computer science, UCLA, 1981-1990.

Personal: Married; two children.

Languages: Can read, write and speak English, French, Spanish, Cantonese, Mandarin and Toishanese; can read and write Japanese.

Career highlights: Physically handicapped program teacher, Los Angeles Unified School District, 1976-77; special day class teacher, Lanai Road School, 1978-79; resource specialist, Valley Diagnostic Center, 1979-80; assistant principal, Sharp Elementary School, 1984-86; principal, Sylmar Elementary School, 1986-90; principal, Vaughn Street School, 1990-present; executive director, Vaughn Next Century Learning Center, 1993.

Quote: “You can’t be a school that just educates. You have to be school that cares, and the community in turn takes care of us.”