"What concerns me is she's getting people [who] belong in this program out," Krikorian said.
District officials are "scared of her. They're scared," said Vazken Movsesian, a Glendale priest who runs an after-school program and supports Khachatrian. He said he noticed many students "hitting their heads against the wall because they were frustrated, because they couldn't move ahead."
He met Khachatrian at a school board meeting. "For the first time I saw a woman, Naira, who was really advocating for the students," he said. "She had no other motive."
Some parents said the TV broadcast is their main link to understanding district policies.
Eskouhi Irzakhanian, the mother of a fifth-grader in Glendale Unified, called Khachatrian after watching the program earlier this year.
She believes the district unfairly placed her son in special education classes and did not explain why. "He's just lazy," she said, "but laziness is not disability."
She signed consent forms without knowing what they meant. It was Khachatrian who explained her rights.
"In my country, Armenia, we know what's going on. We know the laws. We grew up there," Irzakhanian said. "But here, we are new. We need someone to explain." Without the TV show, she added, "how would we know?"
