The gems of the Beverly Hills Unified School District are the many wonderful faculty and staff members.

I want to tell you about two of the very best, Annette Levy Goldstein of Horace Mann and Pete Van Rossum of BHHS. Incredibly and coincidentally both are in their 33d year of teaching in our special District.

Annette is in her eighth year of teaching our four year olds in Transitional Kindergarten (T-K) which is a public-school year between preschool and regular kindergarten. All children who turn four on or before September 1 of the school year are eligible.

From early childhood, Annette assisted her school teacher mother with her class work and knew that she wanted to be a teacher. After obtaining her undergraduate degree and an Arizona teaching certificate from the University of Arizona, she obtained a Master’s degree and California teaching certificate. She chose National University’s program because they offered evening classes. She worked as a long-term substitute teacher in San Diego during the day while attending classes at night to complete the master’s degree program.

She was hired immediately as a counselor in our District and over the next few years taught at every level at Horace Mann except for First Grade. She is a mom of two children and believes that the job of a school teacher is a great job for a mom.

I can speak from experience that this is true. My mom Ann Littman Ostroff taught for many years in the public schools of Washington, DC and loved it. I loved having a mom who was a school teacher (just not at my school).

The District offers three T-K classes at Horace Mann and three at El Rodeo. Each has a maximum of twenty children and a teacher and a teacher’s aide.

Annette’s enthusiasm for her work is infectious. She loves her work as a T-K teacher. She defines her objective as “making kids happy and feel safe at school.” From all reports, she succeeds magnificently.

She explains that if a class is fun, safe, creative and collaborative, the students will tend to feel gratification and that they are smart. And she says that each one of her students believes that they are her favorite. While she has no favorites, she loves that they feel that way. She is concerned that our children seem to live more structured lives which leaves little time for them to just have play time and be kids.

I asked her what has changed over the more than three decades of her Horace Mann career. Surprisingly, technology takes a backseat to the fact that in today’s families both parents work so each child tends to have a support network of several people. And she is one of them.

By the same token, Annette is very grateful for her Horace Mann family. She explained that she, like everyone of us, has gone through very challenging times and her Horace Mann family has always been her support system.

She notes that while technology is not really a part of the education of T-K students, email and texting are very useful in communicating with parents and other educators.

With respect to the District, she speaks very positively about the emphasis on small class size which gives Horace Mann a private school feel. She feels that Superintendent Alex Cherniss knows her and other teachers and listens to them. She observes that families are very invested in the community and the community comes together to celebrate the good things. A downside of declining enrollment, however, is that there are fewer choices and opportunities.

Annette notes that there is an undesirable level of tolerance of punctuality or disciplinary issues. Her feeling is that there is undue emphasis on minimizing records of punctuality and discipline for the purpose of winning awards. She regrets that the District has curtailed or ended allowing teachers to attend professional development conferences.

Pete Van Rossum teaches AP European History to tenth graders and government and economics to seniors.

He grew up in Orange County and by his description was not an engaged or successful student. After working for a few years after high school, he returned to school in his early 20s and immediately became engaged and successful. He received an undergraduate degree, a master’s degree and his teaching credential from UCLA.

He did student teaching at BHHS and has stayed ever since. He says that BHHS is unique because of the community values education. He points out that the school has magnificent resources and many very positive role models exist in the community. He regrets, however, the diminishing enrollment while allowing for more focus on detail, means that the talent pool is not as deep as it once was.

Pete says that the best part of his job is that he gets to work with ideas on a daily basis and that there is always something to learn. He finds that observing his students begin to think like adults is very rewarding, He tries to impart to them the importance of things like a free press and a fair justice system and the fact that they can all go away if we do not protect them.

On the other hand, he feels that disciplinary standards have diminished and that there is much too much bureaucratic oversight from the federal and stte government levels down to the District level. He also regrets that the Board of Education is so divided but notes that there are no easy answers.

And there is the issue of artificial intelligence and how it is used by students. He observes that a serious problem with its use, for example, to write analytical reports is that it deprives the user with the long term memory of such an analysis. Because the student did not do the analysis. Also, policing the improper use is time consuming and very difficult. But, sooner or later, the student must take an exam in which no outside sources are available and that’s where the piper must be paid (my metaphor, not Pete’s).

So he left me with this quote from H.L. Mencken that he displays in his office:

“For every complex problem there is an answer that is clear, simple, and wrong.”

***

For someone (me) who is always striving to bring you an observation or two that will inform, the Beverly Hills Unified School District during the Presidency of Judith Manouchehri is the gift that keeps on giving.

This note comes under the heading:

“You just can’t make this stuff up.”

BHUSD recently published a puff piece entitled “BHUSD INSIGHT An official publication of the Beverly Hills Unified School District, Volume 1, Issue 1, Summer 2026. A New Era of Excellence.”

My suspicion is that this piece of propaganda was prepared at District expense and is used as a handout for Ms. Manouchehri’s electioneering.

The heading on page 2 reads “Academic Excellence by Every Measure” and goes on to make claims of achievement. These claims included “11 National Merit Scholars Finalist (sic)”. In fact, there were TWO National Merit Scholarship Finalists. This exaggeration was corrected later on the website to read “11 National Merit Commended Students.” OK – everyone makes mistakes.

But then this self-proclaimed tribute that gives new meaning to the term “excellence” goes on to provide (with no context or explanation) a series of “Highest Scores Since 2017”.

The one that caught my eye right after +4% in English Language Arts was:

“+5% Mathmatics”

Now it has been a very long time since I learned how to spell the word “mathematics” but my strong suspicion is that the spelling has not changed. Check it out. That embarrassing error is still on the BHUSD.org website.

[I must credit former Commissioner and engaged resident Rich Waldow for bringing this to my attention.]

And we wonder why this Board of Education has presided over a continued decline in our rankings that we can only hope to arrest with a change in leadership.