Bernstein High Faces Challenges and Meets Them

Every day thousands of drivers on Sunset Boulevard pass by the Helen Bernstein Complex in Hollywood, but most of them probably don't know much about the 3-year-old campus.

Like students at many schools these days, the 1,400 at Bernstein's three schools are coping with nebulous budget cuts.

At Bernstein High, Principal Angela Hewlett-Bloch has overseen the improvements around campus and helped her staff adjust to the district budget cuts this year.

Hewlett-Bloch, who stepped into the post in July, spoke to Hollywood Patch about the recent changes and achievements.

Hollywood Patch: Which accomplishments are you most proud of at Bernstein High this school year?

Angela Hewlett-Bloch: First about our staff, we have an excellent group of teachers willing to take up the challenge at a very difficult time. They come to the table ready to work. We had to do schedule changes midyear. Some of the teachers picked up additional courses to help balance our programs and make sure we were able to reduce class size appropriately and they did it. I’m ever thankful to them. It’s tough when the teachers only have one free period in an eight period schedule, it gets very stressful. I have to say they are holding up really well.

We have great students, I think our students have risen to the challenge. We are asking them to do some different things around campus: help us with the cleanup effort, travel different routes around campus—as teenagers do, they always have another way they prefer to do things—but they are going along with the program. When I go into classrooms I see students who are engaged, which speaks a lot to what the teachers are doing and also speaks to the nature of the student attitude. I think we’ve made some great improvements and we’re also looking at improving the look of the campus.

Patch: What are some of the improvements taking place?

Hewlett-Bloch: There are a few items still to be completed from the original construction that my local district superintendent Dr. Vigil and the central office have been very supportive in helping me get done. We have a marquee for the school that’s going up. We have a scoreboard that's going up on the oustide. They have helped me in making sure we get some safety fencing along the open stairwells. They helped us get extra support to clean up certain areas of the campus and get things repaired in an efficient manner so that we can maintain this really lovely state-of-the-art site we have here. It’s just really beautiful.

We’re very visible. We’re right on the corner of Sunset, right by Channel 5. They can look down from the tower!

Patch: How is Bernstein affected by the budget cuts?

Hewlett-Bloch: At this point we’re doing budget planning. We know that we have quite a bit less than we did last year. The school received money from the stimulus fund. Well, that ends this year and for us that amounts to close to a $1 million. The primary expense with that money was to purchase additional teachers to lower class size. We get other categorical funds so now we have to look to these funds to figure out how we can utilize those to do the same thing, which means there are other resources you lose.

The district is not paying for a librarian this year. We have to figure out how to pay for a librarian or close this amazing library with 20 computers. How do we keep that open if we don’t have a librarian?

A college counselor, we have to figure out how to pay for that. The district doesn’t provide that, that was an expense the school paid for on its own. Now with less money we have to find a way to pay for that.

And a lot of people are getting cut. I don’t know where we are as far as furloughs are concerned.

Some of our staff has received notices—I’ve received mine. Not that I would be laid off, but depending on what kind of bumping there is as it comes down from folks who are in positions higher than me who have return rights as a principal, I could get bumped back to my last position where I have tenure as an assistant principal.

It’s a scary and uncomfortable time for everybody because we don’t know where all of us are going to land. The teachers are hanging tough and they know that a third of them are going to be gone, possibly, as a result of the RIF (Reduction in Force) notices. So we’re figuring out how to make it work.

Patch: What do you think the community should know about Bernstein?

Hewlett-Bloch: They should know the complex offers three options for schools, but almost four little schools are here with the different small learning communities.

We have the arts, music and entertainment program; the business technology labor relations program; we have the STEM academy—for science, technology,  engineering and medicine; and we have APEX—the Academic Performance Excellence program. And with that, because when  you think about a small school, you don’t think about having the resources of a comprehensive high school. They have four choices in essence and all the benefits of a comprehensive high school. We have a full range of sports activities. We have a beautiful swimming pool, a beautiful soccer field. If students have some idea or no idea about what they want to do as a career, they can come and dabble. They can at least have an opportunity to get a taste of it. We’re looking forward to the installation of our broadcast studio. That’s going to be exciting.