Barbara Howard is a main character in ABC's hit mockumentary sitcom Abbott Elementary. Barbara is an old-school kindergarten teacher at Willard R. Abbott Elementary School and has been teaching for twenty years.
She is portrayed by Sheryl Lee Ralph.
Personality[]
Barbara Howard is perhaps the most seasoned and longest working teacher at Abbott Elementary. Although she only has Kindergarten students, children of all ages at the school seem to respect her, as shown when rowdy classrooms immediately settle down when she demands it. The other teachers also revere her, especially Janine Teagues, who Barbara slowly started to accept as her "work daughter". While she is admired by her coworkers this does not save her from being the occasional brunt of jokes, none of which are said to her directly, about her age and mixing up famous people's names.
As a pious woman of God, Mrs. Howard's favorite day is Sunday, "the good Lord's day". She attends church often, but maintains a light sense of humor about it rather than being rigid, and helps serve as a voice of reason for her fellow teachers. She is married to Gerald Howard, with whom she has two daughters. Her and her eldest daughter Taylor Howard don't have the best relationship, but they still share a loving bond. Additionally, out of all the Abbott staff, her closest relationship appears to be with Melissa Schemmenti as the two spend the most time together.
According to Barbara's actress Sheryl Lee Ralph: "Barbara is committed to human beings. Her love of her job, the love of the students that are entrusted in her care, every year. [She is] the kind of person that would agree to disagree, but trust me, in the end you’re going to agree with her. I just love that about her. She’s a wonderful human being."[1]
History[]
Pre-Series[]
Barbara has been a teacher for at least 30 years[2], and has worked within the Philadelphia school system for at least 20 years[3]. Since the series occurs in the present day, it can be inferred that she has been teaching since the 1980s or very early 1990s. Her first class at Willard R. Abbott Elementary School included Draemond Winding, who later went on to found Legendary Charters[4]. Earlier in her career, when she began working with Melissa Schemmenti, she used to dress like Janine.[5] Her age has not been stated, but it implied that she is approaching retirement age.[5]
It is unknown how old she was when she married her husband Gerald Howard. He was a "player and a flirt" when they got together, and Barbara managed to encourage him to settle down with her.[6] Her eldest daughter, Taylor Howard, is a young adult in her approximate mid-20s, and is a sales representative who lives in New York.[7] Little is known about her younger daughter, Gina Howard, other than that she was in a young engineers program.[6]
Season 1[]
"I'm Barbara Howard, Woman of God. I do my work, I go home. I get my nails done every week, and I love teaching." - Barbara Howard (S01E01: Pilot)
Pilot[]
Barbara Howard is first introduced in the first episode as a quite formidable and jaded figure at William R Abbott Elementary school. Along with her closest friend and fellow teacher Melissa, she is one of the school's longest standing staff members, having a career spanning several decades. She has developed a highly respected and favorable reputation among her colleagues and ex-students, despite the fact the school is badly underfunded - she has had to be creative and resourceful with what little has been provided, and has become worn-down with the fact that nothing ever improves despite many years of attempts. The situation at the school is so severe, in fact, that new principal Ava Coleman is able to invite a documentary crew to follow Barbara and her colleagues' everyday work lives, with the intention to document "underfunded, poorly-managed public schools in America", of which Abbott is a prime example. Barbara finds the cameras very disruptive to her ability to teach.
A year prior, a cohort of twenty two teachers joined the school staff, and only two teachers remained after a year: second-grade teacher Janine Teagues, and history teacher Jacob Hill. Barbara is initially particularly combative and passive-aggressive to Janine, who believes she can make a significant difference to the school because of her youth and lack of experience within the system. Janine's belief goes against Barbara's many years of experience trying to make changes and being rejected at every turn, and has become very cynical and fixed in her belief that the situation won't change. Janine submits a request for funding, which is accepted - but the money is then wasted by Ava on a flashy new school sign, instead of improving the school environment in any way, further reinforcing Barbara's pessimism. Janine contacts the superintendent to complain, but it bounces back to Ava's inbox. Ava calls a meeting in which she encourages her colleagues to insult Janine, but they all refuse: Janine argues that she did it because she cares about the children at the school, and that shouldn't be a bad thing, and Barbara concurs, frustrated by Ava being yet another example of principals who do nothing to help the school's dire situation.
Her opinion of Janine further softens once she learns that the root cause of Janine's desire to obtain additional funding for the school was to replace her soiled and damaged classroom rug, where one of her students who has an unstable home environment sleeps every lunchtime because it's softer than his bed at home. The student is one of Barbara's former students. Barbara offers for each of the teachers to pull funds together to replace the rug, despite the fact they can't afford to, but Melissa is able to obtain replacement rugs for each classroom by contacting one of her "guys". From this point onwards, although still of the belief that Janine is too "cheerful and naive", she takes on a more parental, mentorship role to Janine, and the two become closer.(Pilot)[3]
Mentorship[]
Janine tries to encourage Barbara to use technology to obtain items on her online wishlist for school supplies, but Barbara refuses. Janine goes behind her back to make a video on her behalf, with online influencers purchasing every item on her list as a means of exploiting doing a good deed for online content, disrupting her class. Barbara confronts Janine, explaining that the reason she doesn't push the wishlist is because many of the students come from low-income backgrounds, and so she doesn't want them to "feel less than because they do not have stuff", instead highlighting what they do have: who they are as individuals, and encourages Janine to practice the same.(Wishlist)[8]
Barbara also begins to become a mentor figure to new teacher Gregory Eddie, who is having trouble with a child's parent who isn't bringing their child to school on time, but he is trying to avoid the awkward conversation. Barbara tricks Gregory into joining her at her nail appointment, where she knows the parent will also be. He is able to resolve the problem by being forced to talk to her, and Barbara uses it as a teachable moment for him, because "you've got to learn to say what you need, to get what you want." (Light Bulb)[9]
Season 2[]
Relationships[]
Gerald Howard[]
Though little is known about their relationship, Barbara and her husband Gerald appear to be a very happily married couple, going on regular cruise vacations[10] and took a date to the airport to watch the planes on Valentine's Day[11]. He occasionally visits Barbara at school to have lunch together[6]. When they first became a couple, Gerald was a "player and a flirt", but Barbara was able to settle him down into a family man[6]. When Gerald had a prostate cancer scare, Barbara was so shaken that she accidentally caused a fire in the teacher's lounge by leaving a candle unattended[12].
Melissa Schemmenti[]
Melissa is Barbara's closest friend at Abbott, having spent several decades working together. They notably share a specific table in the teachers' lounge every lunch period, from which they very rarely stray. Despite their moral differences in many ways they have a profound respect for one another, particularly as teachers, and are usually the first in line to give the other support in times of crisis. Notably, Melissa helped Barbara cope with her insecurities about aging and feeling aged-out of teaching[5][13], and was the first at Abbott to hear about Gerald's prostate cancer scare, encouraging Barbara to finally open up about it[12]. Barbara was fundamental in helping Melissa realize that she deserved the support of a teachers' aide while she was trying to teach two classes at once[14], and helped give Melissa the confidence to finally start dating again after her divorce[6]. Because they are so close they rarely argue, but when do they know how to hit each other where it hurts the most (though aren't able to stay angry at one another for much more than a day or two before reconciling)[15][16]. Despite Barbara having a very strict moral compass, she notably "shook down" Delisha Sloss in order to help secure funding for Abbott, as well as to regain Melissa's trust, in her words "I shook someone down for us"[15]. Melissa, on the other hand, once stated to her other colleagues: "I ain't killing for any of ya. Except Barbara."[17]. Barbara and Melissa have several annual traditions together as a pair, including a special Christmas dinner and drinks at in the teachers' lounge on the last day of the school year[18], and drinking, partying, and lounging by the pool together at the PECSA teachers' conference instead of attending presentations[16].
According to Sheryl Lee Ralph, who plays Barbara: "I think the friendship of it all is so wonderful, that it's not like the good girl, bad girl kitties. We are mature women, living our life, experiencing friendship together and I'm sure we come from two very different parts of town, but when it comes to that school, we are good friends and we have a great understanding of what it takes to keep Abbott Elementary moving forward. I love that dynamic because it's something that we don't see a lot, you know? Lisa talks about this often, how there's always maybe that one mature woman in a show and she has no real life, but with this, you have two women that have real lives and a real friendship, and I love the way the audience loves it."[19]
According to Lisa Ann Walter, who plays Melissa: "Barbara and Melissa can have an entire conversation without speaking a word to each other. They have lived next to each other in those seats in that break room, walked to their cars, and sent short text messages that words are hardly needed. I think that's the reason people respond so much to that relationship. They call us work wives, and that's what it feels like both in the characters and in life.[20] They are friends who are "at very disparate points of view and personalities, but will do anything for each other, work wives, ride-or-dies (…) it makes sense to me that these people are really in a best friend love affair with each other, and will accept other people, other people can come in and have relationships with them, but it's really about this pair."[21]
Janine Teagues[]
Initially, Janine rubs Barbara up the wrong way because her endless optimism for what can be done to fix Abbott are antithetical to what Barbara has experienced over many years of trying to get additional funding and support for herself, her colleagues and her students.[3] However, over time, Barbara's opinion of her softens as she comes to realize that her sometimes quite extreme behavior comes from wanting to do good for her students, and Barbara can see much of herself younger, less jaded self in Janine.
Because Janine has such a poor and distant relationship with her real mother Vanetta[22], Janine looks to Barbara as as surrogate mother figure in her life, and idolizes her both as a teacher as a person. According to series creator Quinta Brunson, who plays Janine: "She wants a mother figure. She wants a mother, and she sees that in Barbara, and she just wishes she could have that. Poor girl."[23] A very significant turning point in Barbara and Janine's relationship occurred when Barbara met Vanetta for the first time, and Barbara saw first hand how Janine was being emotionally manipulated by her in order to extort her for cash. Barbara was so unsettled that stepped in to defend Vanetta belittling her, and even offered to give Vanetta the $600 she was asking Janine for to try and protect her, despite her own low salary.[22]
Ava Coleman[]
Gregory Eddie[]
Jacob Hill[]
Development[]
When Sheryl Lee Ralph initially read the pilot script, she wanted to play principal Ava Coleman, but series creator Quinta Brunson responded: "Absolutely not! We need a queen for Barbara and that is you."[1]
Memorable Quotes[]
- "Janine, turn that down, please! I'm trying to teach my kindergartners the letter "C", and they are distracted by this song. It's like "Back That Azz Up" for kids.[3]
- "Janine is a lot of things. Naive, a bit clingy, too cheerful. But she is also right. You know, actually wanting to help the children at this school shouldn't be a bad thing."[3]
- "Teachers at a school like Abbott, we have to be able to do it all. We are admin, we are social workers, we are therapists, we are second parents - hell, sometimes we're even first. Why? Huh, it sure ain't the money."[3]
- "Our job is to build them up, make them confident. Is it nice to have stuff? Sure. But my students do not need to feel less than because they do not have stuff. So, we talk about what they do have, not about what they don't."[8]
- "I have been called a bad teacher more times than I can ever remember. People have thrown dirt on my name. Others have given flowers. But it's all a garden to me."[24]
Trivia[]
- She is Christian.
- Barbara's favorite movie is Lilies of the Field starring Sidney Poitier.[25]
- Barbara is the only faculty member at the school that does not wear a lanyard.
Appearances[]
| Abbott Elementary, Season 1 | |||||
| # | Title | # | Title | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1. | "Pilot" | Appears | 8. | "Work Family" | Appears |
| 2. | "Light Bulb" | Appears | 9. | "Step Class" | Appears |
| 3. | "Wishlist" | Appears | 10. | "Open House" | Appears |
| 4. | "New Tech" | Appears | 11. | "Desking" | Appears |
| 5. | "Student Transfer" | Appears | 12. | "Ava vs. Superintendent" | Appears |
| 6. | "Gifted Program" | Appears | 13. | "Zoo Balloon" | Appears |
| 7. | "Art Teacher" | Appears | |||
| Abbott Elementary, Season 2 | |||||
| # | Title | # | Title | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1. | "Development Day" | Appears | 12. | "Fight" | Appears |
| 2. | "Wrong Delivery" | Appears | 13. | "Fundraiser" | Appears |
| 3. | "Story Samurai" | Appears | 14. | "Valentine's Day" | Appears |
| 4. | "The Principal's Office" | Appears | 15. | "Fire" | Appears |
| 5. | "Juice" | Appears | 16. | "Teacher Conference" | Appears |
| 6. | "Candy Zombies" | Appears | 17. | "Mural Arts" | Appears |
| 7. | "Attack Ad" | Appears | 18. | "Teacher Appreciation" | Appears |
| 8. | "Egg Drop" | Appears | 19. | "Festival" | Appears |
| 9. | "Sick Day" | Appears | 20. | "Educator of the Year" | Appears |
| 10. | "Holiday Hookah" | Appears | 21. | "Mom" | Appears |
| 11. | "Read-A-Thon" | Appears | 22. | "Franklin Institute" | Appears |
| Abbott Elementary, Season 3 | |||||
| # | Title | # | Title | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1&2. | "Career Day" | Appears | 9. | "Alex" | Appears |
| 3. | "Gregory's Garden Goofballs" | Appears | 10. | "2 Ava 2 Fest" | Appears |
| 4. | "Smoking" | Appears | 11. | "Double Date" | Appears |
| 5. | "Breakup" | Appears | 12. | "Mother's Day" | Appears |
| 6. | "Willard R. Abbott" | Appears | 13. | "TBA" | Appears |
| 7. | "Librarian" | Appears | 14. | "TBA" | Appears |
| 8. | "Panel" | Appears | |||
References[]
[]
| Abbott Teachers | |
|---|---|
| Abbott Admin & Staff | |
| Abbott Students | |
| School District | |
| Addington Teachers | |
| Family of the Abbott Staff | |
| Significant Others | |
| Friends | |
| Others | |
| Minor Characters • Unnamed Characters (S1) • Unnamed Characters (S2) | |