Marie Panec Marie Panec, a Moorpark College biology professor, Oak Park schools leader, and former Congressional candidate, died of a brain aneurysm on Tuesday morning at Los Robles Hospital and Medical Center in Thousand Oaks. She was 57.

Flags at Oak Park schools were lowered to half-staff in Panec’s memory. At the Oak Park Municipal Advisory Council meeting Tuesday night, community leaders and residents recalled Panec’s many contributions. And at an impromptu memorial service at Moorpark College earlier in the day, current and retired staff gathered to remember Panec.

“People got up and spoke with tears in their eyes, of how she’d been a mentor to them, how she’d impacted them,” said Mary Rees, a fellow Moorpark College biology professor and former Oak Park School Board trustee.

“People needed someplace to go, to reach out and share our joint loss,” Rees said.

Just last week The Acorn had named Panec among its Top 25 Local People of 2011.

“The Acorn really got it right when they included her in their top 25 list,” Rees said. “She was so pleased. I’m so touched that she could have some of the recognition she’s due. I can’t even imagine the number of people and students she affected through her teaching and her advocacy.”

Panec taught biology at Moorpark College for 13 years, served as Life Sciences Department chair, curriculum committee co-chair, and industrial biotechnology program co-founder. She collaborated with colleagues to offer biotechnology workshops to secondary science teachers to introduce middle and high school students to biotechnology careers.

Panec was in her ninth year as an Oak Park Board of Education trustee. She was reelected to a third four-year term in November, earning the most votes of the four candidates. She helped form the district’s Special Education Advisory Committee and helped create an anti-bullying campaign and a comprehensive Chinese language program.

“Her ingenuity enabled many valuable ideas to be brought forth and implemented,” School Board President Barbara Laifman said. “She was a strong and intelligent woman who was not afraid to stand up for and speak emphatically for what she believed in.”

Fellow trustee Jan Iceland called Panec a tireless supporter of education.

“While she watched the dollars carefully, at the same time she always looked out for the best education possible for our students,” Iceland said.

Panec was passionate about children and education, said Oak Park Schools Superintendent Tony Knight.

“To her this meant that children have the right to come to school and not be bullied, that they have the right to be engaged in their classrooms, and that they would give something back to their community and world as she modeled so well for us,” Knight said.

Panec ran unsuccessfully in 2010 for the Democratic nomination in the 24th Congressional District, hoping to unseat incumbent Elton Gallegly. She relished the opportunity to meet people and learn about the district’s diverse needs.

Panec served on the Community Action of Ventura County board, on the Ventura County School Boards Association executive board, and on the Oak Park Recreation and Park Planning Committee.

She was a Girl Scout co-leader for her daughter’s troop and a volunteer teacher for afterschool elementary school science enrichment classes.

Panec and her husband melded Christian and Jewish values to establish a family ethic of service to others. Panec volunteered as a lector at St. Maximilian Kolbe Catholic Church next to Oak Park. She studied Torah weekly at Temple Adat Elohim in Thousand Oaks.

She had advanced degrees in education and science from California State University at Northridge, the University of San Diego, Wesleyan University, and the University of California, Davis. In 2007, she earned her doctorate in higher education from the University of Southern California.

A fitness enthusiast, Panec participated in the annual Great Race of Agoura. In March she ran the race’s Pacific Half Marathon for the first time and, despite a knee injury, completed the course in under three hours.

Panec was the oldest of 10 children. She lived in Oak Park for 25 years. She is survived by her husband, Alan Roll, and daughters, Michelle, who is graduating from Chapman University in two weeks, and Alicia, a University of California, Santa Cruz sophomore, as well as her parents, Don and Sherry Panec of Northridge, and her nine siblings.

Family friend Kaitlin Toomayan, who graduated from Oak Park High in 2007 with Michelle, admired Panec’s love for her daughters.

“She always hugged her girls goodbye and said, ‘I love you’ when we left the house to go somewhere,” Toomayan said.

Services will be held next Tuesday, location to be determined. A scholarship is being established in Panec’s memory to be presented annually to an Oak Park High graduating senior.

Checks, with Panec’s name on the memo line, can be made out to the Community Foundation for Oak Park, which will administer the scholarship. Mail donations to OPUSD, 5802 E. Conifer St., Oak Park, CA 91377.