Springfield Elementary School

Springfield Elementary School is an elementary school which Bart Simpson, Lisa Simpson, and many other children of Springfield, such as Nelson Muntz, Janey Powell, Jimbo Jones, Martin Prince, Ralph Wiggum and Milhouse Van Houten attend.

The principal is Seymour Skinner and its superintendent, who often visits the school, is Gary Chalmers. The school's mascot is a purple puma.

Profile
Springfield Elementary is two stories high, and contains a gym and a cafeteria. The basement includes a steam tunnel. In the earlier episodes (such as seasons 1-5), there is somewhat of a steeple on top of the school roof. The floor plan is identical to that of West Springfield Elementary School. Springfield Elementary School is also based on McCarthy Middle School.

There is a field trip memorial that shows the names of the students who never came back from a field trip. Groundskeeper Willie constantly has to edit the wall, and is very crestfallen and offended when he must engrave the name of a student with a long name, like Bart and Lisa Simpson.

In "At Long Last Leave", it is mentioned that the school sneaks the kids answers to state tests, yet they still fail.

School President

 * Isabel Gutierrez (2013–present)
 * Ralph Wiggum (2012–14)
 * Bart Simpson (2010-12)
 * Lisa Simpson (2007–10)
 * Martin Prince (2005–07)
 * Milhouse Van Houten (2004–05)

School Principal
Dates listed correspond to the years the episodes were broadcast in, rather than a year that the episode was known to take place in.
 * Bart Simpson (Former)
 * Seymour Skinner (Current)
 * Ned Flanders (Former)
 * Seymour Skinner (real) (Former)
 * Meredith Milgram (Former)

Condition
Springfield Elementary is heavily underfunded. With almost constant reductions in the budget the school has been forced to use rather bizarre methods to make up for the lack of funding.

It has been stated many times that the school is filled with asbestos. Underfunding of the school has resulted in a variety of troubling scenarios for students and staff. Sub-standard facilities abound, including a cinder block having replaced the school's tether ball. Cafeteria food in particular is low quality, with food being made from circus animals, cow testicles and hearts, shredded newspaper, and old gym mats. Specific objects served include a cheap substitute for Milk called "Malk," French fries not made of potatoes (with the exception of the fries eaten by the teachers), rat milk, and gravy that is merely water died brown, among others, and it at least sometimes fails to provide vegetarian options. It was revealed that Springfield Elementary was at one time voted "The Most Dilapidated School in Missouri" and was then moved, brick-by-brick, to Springfield. The school is overcrowded because of insufficient funds to build more classrooms.

In addition, the teachers are less than average, known for their lack of ability to teach; in one instance they are shown to be unable to teach without answer keys. They are also often seen smoking and drinking within the school premises. Edna Krabappel frequently brings up aspects of her personal life that would be considered unsuitable for elementary school classes, and at one point even managed to sleep on the job due to a hangover that she presumably got the previous day. Lunchlady Doris was forced to use grade F meat. In addition, Elizabeth Hoover has shown herself to be very cynical about her students, even openly telling Ralph Wiggum that the latter deserves to be mocked, and was diagnosed as psychosomatic. In one instance, she also had Ralph sub for her while she just reads in the background, despite Ralph obviously being unqualified for teaching (simply making a random remark before jumping out of the window.

Before Bart came to the school and before Lisa was born, the school had a swimming pool and Groundskeeper Willie was the swim coach. Skinner took the pool out when he spent an entire weekend inside it, among lots of worms, which made him what he is today. This was a prank made by Andy Hamilton, a former student of the school.

The school was once shown to have a tower with a winding staircase within which led to a fortification area, a feature that has not appeared since. Other short period additions include a disabled ramp access system constructed by local mafia funding (which collapsed shortly thereafter without it ever being used [as the student who acted as the reason for building it, Bart Simpson, who was confined to a wheelchair after an accident, had recovered earlier than expected], and was also revealed to have been made out of breadsticks) which later forced the school to almost close completely until a toy company bought it. The auditorium was once bulldozed to make way for a mini-mall.

At one time, Groundskeeper Willie accidentally struck oil and the school built a large drilling rig on top of the building. Unfortunately, Burns took the oil first and Springfield Elementary was made even poorer due to the cost of deconstructing the drill.

Springfield Elementary was partially converted to a prison to support funds.

The school's address is 19 Plympton Street. When Springfield underwent an economic crisis, Springfield Elementary, as a result of the cutbacks from the slump, significantly shortened the school day to no school at all.

Beneath the school was an oil well (which was accidentally discovered by Groundskeeper Willie while burying Superdude the hamster) which lead Principal Skinner and Superintendent Chalmers to welcome everyone's ideas of how to spend the money, while some ideas were considered ridiculous. Mr. Burns then began to steal the oil from the school, which not only resulted in the loss of their fortune, but the cost of deconstructing the oil platform above the school placed it in a far worse financial state than before, forcing Skinner to get rid of nearly everything in the school. Burns was shot later. It was believed that Skinner was the one who shot him, supported by his going to the bathroom. However, while he did intend to ambush Burns and kill him, he was not the one who shot him, as he had mixed up his camouflage face paint with his mother's makeup while attempting to put camouflage on when it happened, with Chalmers stumbling upon this and thus being able to vouch for Skinner. Similarly, the staff members (more specifically, Groundskeeper Willie and Tito Puente) ended up being forced to lose their jobs because of the aforementioned severe decrease in the school's financial state from Burns's actions, with both also planning revenge on Burns. Groundskeeper Willie planned to murder Burns and (at least initially) wound Waylon Smithers (believing that he was responsible for the acts of his employer as well), and likewise was also a suspect to the shooting, although Willie was cleared as a suspect when it was revealed that, thanks to his playing Space Invaders for an implied long time, he developed arthritis in key areas of his hand, meaning he couldn't have shot Burns, while Tito Puente planned to seek revenge on Mr. Burns by making a very unsavory (and catchy, as Wiggum noted) song about him, even murdering the star would be too kind for him, resulting in Puente being cleared as a suspect as well.

The school library was frequently used by the students, although adults who weren't faculty members frequently used the library as well, a notable example being Homer Simpson, who had to use the student library due to the public "big people's" library in downtown Springfield banning him from the premises due to "unpleasantness," and used it to research Thomas Edison to inspire himself to invent new objects.

It is surprising that the school has managed to stay open with all the problems it has. It was also one of the few landmarks that wasn't destroyed during Trappuccino, much to Bart's disappointment. It has also been confirmed in 500 Keys that there is a hidden classroom, but only for the use of dummies so the school can get publicity.

Current and former Students

 * See List of Springfield Elementary School Students

Behind the Laughter
In the opening credits the school is featured with Bart writing lines on a blackboard. The school's design and apparent floorplan is identical to Chapman Elementary School in Portland, Oregon.

Name of South Carolina school
In 1994, the naming of a new elementary school in Greenwood, South Carolina was left up to the students, and the name Springfield Elementary was chosen. The school board was unaware of the connection to The Simpsons until a protest by one group of parents. The name stood for the school, which opened in 1994. This was later referenced in "Lisa on Ice", where Principal Skinner, upon making an announcement requiring that all students head over to the auditorium, proceeds to kick himself over letting the students name the auditorium the "Butthead Memorial Auditorium" (ironically, a Fox News press release relating to the aforementioned controversy had Bart mentioning "at least they didn't name it "Beavis and Butthead Elementary School").

Trivia

 * Apparently, the school has a policy against faculty members interacting with students. This made evident in "Lisa Simpson, This Isn't Your Life" and "Penny-Wiseguys".
 * Old episodes of The Simpsons reveal that Springfield Elementary had a bell tower, however further seasons show the school without the bell tower.
 * Edna Krabappel, the teacher of Bart Simpson and his classmates, was retired due to the death of her voice actress Marcia Wallace. As of "Left Behind", her husband Ned Flanders has replaced her. Before him, Jack Lassen and Carol Berrera had attempted to replace Edna, but Lassen was fired, and Berrera left to serve in Afghanistan. It is unspecified whether Edna will be voiced by a new actress or replaced by a new teacher.
 * In "Summer of 4 Ft. 2", strangely Bart is officially the best student of the school.
 * Bart was expelled from this school twice and welcomed back. The first time was when he injured Superintendent Chalmers leading the cost of Principal Skinner's promotion and is welcomed back for his efforts when exposing the true history of Whacking Day. The second for disrupting the Medieval Festival with a rat infestation which was actually caused by Groundskeeper Willie who was the one should have been fired. Bart was welcomed back as an apology and Groundskeeper Willie and Principal Skinner were both suspended for blaming him.
 * In early episodes the school exterior alternates between being white and the more common tan/yellow color, often changing color in the same episode, no less. Later episodes correct this continuity problem by making yellow the school's official color, and putting a picture of the "old, white" school in Principal Skinner's office.
 * The school's exact stance on guns is unclear. According to Principal Skinner in The Simpsons: Hit & Run, the school had a "gun free zone" that extended as far as Squidport when confiscating Bart's ray gun (despite the latter's insistence that he needed it as evidence towards an evil plot), but in The Mook, the Chef, the Wife and Her Homer, Otto was apparently allowed to carry a gun inside the school bus in a manner that was implied to be mandatory to his job since Skinner when suspending Otto forced him to hand in his gun.