Kimoanh tries to portray herself as a selfless educator who cares about children and the education system. This only shows you that she is only in it for herself.

I suppose KimOanh Lam is "now" thinking about the kids of the school District in dropping her demand for one million dollars from the taxpayers!? What a hypocrite. Where are all her supporters and advocates who held rallies and press conferences maligning the school officials?

Looking at the legal writing on the wall, KimOanh only dropped the lawsuit because she knows that she will lose, big, and get spanked with a load of court costs and lawyers' fees. What an undignified and selfish person. This case is a good expose' of WHO this person, KimOanh, really is all about.

I thought it was disgraceful that KimOanh Nguyen-Lam would stage protests in front of the school districts office and claim "racism" - considering they did think they wanted to hire her enough to vote to do it in the first place. Her lawsuit was ridiculous.

KimOanh Nguyen Lam is a candidate up for re-election to the Garden Grove School Board. That would be a no-brainer for me, NO vote for her!

Kim Oanh Nguyen Lam is a person of the highest integrity and professionalism. She is committed to students and public service. She would not have sued the school district had she not been wronged.

Ms. Nguyen Lam also serves on the Citizens Oversight Committee of the Coast Community College District, and has demonstrated a high level of fiduciary responsibility and good judgement in assisting the District in representing the interests of taxpayers as it completes implemention of its general obligation bond. Compared to other public officials at Coast, such as Armando Ruiz, that double dip on pensions and run up big travel tabs at the expense of the taxpayer, Nguyen Lam is a beacon of public service and fiscal integrity!!!!

to anonymous at 10:19 PM - obviously you are a Lam supporter. There is another side to this candidate. You may wish to open your mind a little.

Anon @ 10:19 PM,

KO Lam-Nguyen, whatever her real last name is ..... is no public servant. She is spiteful and nasty, but always with a smile before she puts one in on you. People are not fooled by this deception after four years. What has she really done or accomplished anything, other than to promote herself through agitation and lawsuit, as a school board member?

I heard that none of her school board colleagues wants to work with this woman because she goes around bad-mouthing and defaming them. KO is one unpleasant person! I will definitely vote her out this time around.

My name is KimOanh Nguyen-Lam. I thank all of you for the attention you’ve given me, both positive and negative, both truthful and allegations in relation to this case. You deserve to hear directly from me - so I will tell you the facts – it’s your choice to believe them or not – but here they are:

The Background:

• On May 23, 2006, after a four-month and nation-wide search conducted with the assistance of the International Group, the Westminster School Board voted 4-1 to hire Dr. Nguyen-Lam as the new Superintendent for the Westminster School District.
• Board President Ms. Marquez telephoned and congratulated Dr. Nguyen-Lam that evening, and informed her that she was the new superintendent of the WSD.
• The head of International Group, Dr. Robert Aguilar, also telephoned and informed Dr. Nguyen-Lam that the Board had selected her.
• The interim WSD Superintendent, Dr. Lopez informed Dr. Nguyen-Lam that she was to begin her three-year term on July 1, 2006.
• The next morning, the district sent out press releases to major newspapers including the L.A. Times and O. C. Register announcing the hiring of the new WSD superintendent, Dr. Nguyen-Lam.
• Local television stations and major newspapers around the world covered the news of her hiring because she would have been the first Vietnamese American person hired in the United States as a Superintendent of a public school system.
• Most importantly, she would have been the first superintendent who possessed the cross-cultural competency and language skills to effectively communicate to students and parents in a district where over 80% of the 10,000 students come from Spanish or Vietnamese speaking households.

• One week after the vote to hire Dr. Nguyen-Lam, two Westminster School Board trustees, Judy Ahrens and James Reed, rescinded their vote to hire Dr. Nguyen-Lam.
• There was no explanation given to Dr. Nguyen-Lam for the vote change.
• The public outcry, community protests and media pressure prompted the two board members to state unfounded negative claims to defend their decision reversal.
• Two community protests took place – the first one, a week after the vote rescission, estimated between 150-200 people was spontaneous. Community members and WSD parents came to the board meeting to demand an answer.
• The second protest – a rally organized by a community group – For Our Children – inspired by Silvia Mendez’ case “Para Todos Los Ninos”- brought together 600 people and numerous multilingual media outlets from LA to SD.
• Parents who had never attended board meetings showed up to speak and expressed their anger and disappointment to board members at the rally. Some board members avoided looking directly at parents by wearing dark glasses.

The Lawsuit:

• Primary motive: to prevent similar injustices from happening again to others in the future
• Legal contentions included: breach of contract, discrimination, brown act violation and defamation.
• There were many layers to the case and defamation was one of the first key legal arguments.
• Since the case began in Fall of 2006, there had been court decisions that gave board members greater leeway in their public comments which put this case at a disadvantage.
• Even when a decision was ruled in our favor there were appeals and counter-appeals....You can read the court document available on the web (www.occourts.org Case No. 07CC02899)

Decision to Dismiss
• Anyone who has ever been involved in a lawsuit knows that justice does not necessarily translate into victory unless there is unlimited resources to pursue it
• This court case has caused undue stress and is draining me of time, energy and financial resources
• My health is being impacted – I suffered from stress-induced Bell’s Palsy and other illnesses in recent months
• I made a decision to focus my attention and energy on my family (recently engaged), my work (recently appointed as the Executive Director of the Strategic Language Initiative for the 23-campus CSU System) and serving the community (beside being a trustee of GGUSD, I serve on the boards of several community-based organizations and host a weekly education television show and a bi-weekly public radio program.)

And finally, I believe that Westminster School District has made some good progress in the last two years including the stability that the new superintendent brings and a greater effort to build a better relationship with the district’s parents and community members. I do think the entire incident including the court case will help not only WSD but also other school boards to avoid this kind of bad decisions in the future. The incident was written up as a case study and published in the UCLA Journal of Public Policy last spring. It is available on my website. For those who would like to judge my competency and relationship with other board members, please make time to attend one of our board meetings (1st and 3rd Tuesdays at 7PM). Additionally for those who wish to learn more of my community activities and public service, please visit my website at
www.kimoanh4us.org.

THANK YOU!

I did not sense the hate from KimOanh Lam-Nguyen for suing the board when she felt violated. She was entitled to her experience. There is the hate from the comments here. It reflects from the expressed thoughts. Freedom from hate would open more to a productive dialogue. :-))