Lawndale Elementary names Zach district's first Teacher of the Year

Lawndale Elementary School District officials announced Zach as the district's first Teacher of the Year during a recent district meeting and said they will submit his nomination to the Los Angeles County Teacher of the Year program.

District staff emphasized the recognition as a milestone for the district’s new award program and described a unanimous selection by a committee that the nominee did not know about in advance. "This year, we are so proud to announce our first teacher of the year for Lawndale Elementary School District, and we could not think of somebody who deserves it more than Zach," a district staff member said. "There was a whole committee in a process. We had to exclude her out of it. But unbeknownst to her, it was unanimous that you should be our district's first name."

The district also noted this is its first year participating in the Los Angeles County Teacher of the Year program and said it will submit a district nomination. "This is our first year that we'll be participating in the LA County Teacher of the year program, which now we will be submitting our nomination for our district for the LA County Teacher of the year," the staff member added. The announcement did not specify a date for the county submission or provide a last name for Zach.

No formal vote or ordinance was recorded in the transcript for this announcement; the remarks were presented as an award notification and as intent to nominate for the county program. The transcript did not identify who was excluded from the selection process or explain why that exclusion occurred.

The district meeting did not provide further details about the nomination timeline, selection criteria, or whether the county nomination requires additional documentation or board approval. Those specifics were not specified in the recorded remarks.