Orange County Superintendent Of Education

After 24 years in office, voters on Tuesday handed County Supt. of Schools Robert Peterson a crushing defeat and elected John F. Dean, a veteran educator strongly backed by the state's teacher's union. A dejected Peterson said Dean's 2-1 margin of victory was "larger than I expected--I thought it would be closer." "Folks must feel that I'm ready for retirement, although I don't feel that way," said Peterson, 70. "But the voters are supreme."

After 24 years in office, voters on Tuesday handed County Supt. of Schools Robert Peterson a crushing defeat and elected John F. Dean, a veteran educator strongly backed by the state's teacher's union. A dejected Peterson said Dean's 2-1 margin of victory was "larger than I expected--I thought it would be closer." "Folks must feel that I'm ready for retirement, although I don't feel that way," said Peterson, 70. "But the voters are supreme."

John F. Dean, the college professor who is mounting the first serious challenge to Robert Peterson in Peterson's 24 years as county schools superintendent, has a campaign war chest more than five times greater than the incumbent's with just a month to go before the election, according to financial disclosure reports.

County Supt. of Schools Robert Peterson and challenger John F. Dean headed into the home stretch of their tight race Wednesday night, answering tough questions from a large crowd of educators and taking snipes at each other during a forum. Meeting at a joint gathering of the Assn. of California School Administrators and the Orange County School Boards Assn. at the Irvine Marriott, the two spent an hour fielding probing questions submitted by the more than 100 educators in attendance.

County Supt. of Schools Robert Peterson and challenger John F. Dean headed into the home stretch of their tight race Wednesday night, answering tough questions from a large crowd of educators and taking snipes at each other during a forum. Meeting at a joint gathering of the Assn. of California School Administrators and the Orange County School Boards Assn. at the Irvine Marriott, the two spent an hour fielding probing questions submitted by the more than 100 educators in attendance.

Physical education students are exercising indoors, where running and playing ball are not allowed, because a field at Washington Middle School is not fit for play. Students will continue to meet in the cafeteria, classrooms and other small spaces for at least another month while La Habra City School District officials scramble to get the money needed to repair the grassless field, which has a deep trench and protruding pipes.

Robert D. Peterson, Orange County superintendent of education, criticized as "totally erroneous" Thursday a grand jury report that called for cutting back the Orange County Department of Education. Peterson said that the county Department of Education, which has a $51-million budget this school year, doesn't waste taxpayer money or needlessly duplicate services, as the grand jury had charged.

Foothill High School in the Tustin Unified School District is the Academic Decathlon champion of Orange County for the second year in a row. The school's win in the 1985 contest, held last Saturday, was announced Thursday night at the Academic Decathlon awards banquet at the Disneyland Hotel. As the reigning champ, Foothill High's team will represent Orange County in the Jan. 3 state Academic Decathlon on the Rancho Santiago College campus in Santa Ana.

The Orange County superintendent of education is not, as the name might imply, the leading voice for educational issues in the county by any statutory obligation. But as a practical matter, there is a reasonable expectation of broader inspirational leadership to be found in someone with that title. The question is, can the person holding the office, charged with very specific duties, fill the larger bill? The answer in the case of the incumbent John F. Dean is a resounding yes.

In a pioneering effort to fight both gangs and peer pressure to dress expensively, the La Habra City School District will ask all students in kindergarten through fifth grade to wear only white and navy outfits when school opens next week. The district, which has 4,800 students, is believed to be the first in Orange County and one of just a handful in the state to opt for standard dress districtwide. "I don't know of any other school district that has decided to do this," said John F.

John F. Dean, the college professor who is mounting the first serious challenge to Robert Peterson in Peterson's 24 years as county schools superintendent, has a campaign war chest more than five times greater than the incumbent's with just a month to go before the election, according to financial disclosure reports.

Orange County's secondary schools are on a roll. A week after the county's schools received generally high grades on new state-issued "report cards," state education officials Tuesday disclosed that, based on population, a disproportionately high number of its high schools and junior high schools will participate in a national competition to honor "exemplary schools." The county had 17 high schools and junior highs among the 84 that were chosen statewide for the first round of the U.S.

More than half of Los Angeles Unified School District's elementary campuses raised their state achievement rankings last year, far outpacing the rate of improvement of other elementary schools in the region, data released Thursday showed. Still, Los Angeles Unified elementary schools have a long way to go: On average, they remain in the bottom half statewide. The district's middle and high schools did not show as much improvement.