2 Vocal Critics of Pasadena Schools Vie in Runoff Today

With a chorus of civic voices calling for an overhaul of Pasadena’s beleaguered public schools, voters today will elect a new school board member who many believe can help set the tone for reform.

Rene Amy, a 40-year-old father of two and the Pasadena Unified School District’s most vocal critic, is facing off against Alex P. Aghajanian, a 43-year-old father of three and attorney who graduated from Pasadena’s schools.

Both say they want a seat on the five-member board to drastically change the way the Pasadena system teaches children.

Amy says the 24,000-student system needs to replace its superintendent and eliminate what he criticizes as “educrat ideas.”

“If any company were run like the Pasadena Unified, it would have gone out of business years ago,” said Amy, whose grass-roots exposes of district country club retreats and staff tapping into Internet pornography sites have made the nightly local news.

Aghajanian, of Altadena, endorses a back-to-basics approach that would end social promotion and abandon what he calls gimmicky programs in the ethnically diverse district that serves Pasadena, Altadena and Sierra Madre.

“We need positive change,” said the construction litigation lawyer. “We need to take a step back and look and see what is working. We’re cheating our children.”

Both decry the fact that Pasadena Unified’s 10th-graders scored below their peers in the much-maligned Los Angeles Unified system on state standardized math tests.

And as in Los Angeles and elsewhere, so-called white flight has emptied Pasadena’s classrooms of some of its brightest students. There are more than 7,500 children in the Pasadena Unified attendance area who go to private schools.

Aghajanian’s children are among them, which has become a factor in the board race. Amy’s son and daughter attend a public middle school but spend part of the day at home in an independent study program.

In the November primary, Amy and Aghajanian were top voter-getters, edging out the favored ex-Blair High football coach Porfirio Frausto. The runoff winner will serve out the 11 months remaining on the term of ex-board member George Padilla, who resigned to devote more time to his business.

The pair rode a wave of parental discontent that has prompted the Pasadena City Council to set up a citizens task force to seek better oversight of the district. Meanwhile, leaders in unincorporated Altadena are calling for the area to secede from the district.

“Education and the public schools are the No. 1 issue,” said Pasadena Mayor Bill Bogaard.

Parent Peter Soelter is vying for the open seat as a write-in candidate. “I do not want to vote for a candidate who has extreme and sometimes radical views, nor do I want to vote for a candidate who chooses to not send his children to schools in the district,” he said, taking a swipe at both opponents.

Despite education being a high priority, many fear a repeat of the primary’s turnout--less than 10%--because much of the campaign has taken place during the holidays.

In sparsely attended forums, Amy and Aghajanian have denounced a proposal by school officials that a ban on social promotion--the practice of sending students to the next grade, regardless of skill--apply to only certain grades.

But their styles contrast. Aghajanian--a Pasadena Tournament of Roses Assn. member, youth club director and soccer coach--is the consummate arbitrator.

Amy, a contractor, is an admitted gadfly with a reputation for tenacity. Frustrated by the district’s use of money, he set up a Web site called AUDIT THE PU$D that documents alleged waste, including bar tabs charged by administrators.

Critics say Amy’s focus on small wrongdoings distracts from discussion of larger and more serious issues.

They accuse him of being an extremist who opposed the $240-million school bond issue approved by voters in November 1997. But Amy’s moxie has won him the endorsement of the Pasadena Board of Realtors and others.

“He expresses the emotions of many parents,” said Councilman Paul Little. “When there weren’t enough textbooks, he got people to picket and forced the district to get more.”

Aghajanian’s critics question how he can oversee the schools from which he withdrew his children not long ago. Aghajanian said he had no choice. “My son was going into a class of 40 children with a teacher who never taught an hour,” he said.

His children and thousands of others will return to Pasadena’s schools, he said, if he accomplishes his goals.