GGUSD Honors Community Heroes

• Wednesday, March 2, 2022

At its March 1 meeting, the Garden Grove Unified School District paid special tribute to three Community Heroes, including local non-profit organizations H.O.P.E. and Project Kinship as well as retired administrator Ron Zajec.  The Community Heroes program is designed to honor district partners that are going above and beyond to make a life-changing impact on district students, families, or staff.

GGUSD has enjoyed a long-standing partnership with H.O.P.E. which provides safety net services to families dealing with abuse, food insecurity, homelessness and other hardships.  Additionally, H.O.P.E. provides academic enrichment programs, music lessons, STEM, art education, and mentoring.  GGUSD’s Board of Education thanked H.O.P.E. Founder Gayle Knight for the organization’s work to help GGUSD families in the most tragic of circumstances. Knight is well-known by district Family Resource Center and school staff who frequently refer families to H.O.P.E. for a variety of services and resources.

Project Kinship provides a multitude of services to support the social-emotional wellness of students at the district’s 8 high schools. Project Kinship staff are skilled at leading restorative circles, de-escalating conflict, and helping students make positive choices.  They provide crisis intervention, facilitate trauma-informed and restorative justice curriculum, and conduct mediations with staff and students. The GGUSD Board thanked Project Kinship Executive Director Steven Kim and staff for all they do to support students including providing counseling, and a variety of youth development opportunities.

The Board also honored Ron Zajec who retired as an administrator from the district in 2016 but has continued to serve year after year as an interim administrator providing support and coaching at GGUSD schools.  Zajec also served as a volunteer of the district’s Vaccination Clinic and played a key role in ensuring the clinic ran smoothly each day. Even in the summer, Zajec returns, lending his time and talent to serve as a principal in the district’s Summer School program.

“These wonderful Community Heroes make enormous contributions to the success of our district,” said Board of Education Trustee Dina Nguyen. “Our students gain countless benefits from the services these organizations and individuals provide.”

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