Melissa Schemmenti

Melissa Schemmenti teaches second grade at Abbott Elementary with the brisk authority of someone who has seen every excuse a kid or an administrator can invent. Philly to her bones, she keeps her classroom running through sheer force of will, drops cryptic references to favors and connections nobody dares question, and treats sentimentality as something to be handled quickly and then ignored.

Lisa Ann Walter plays her like a woman who has already solved the problem you're describing and is mildly annoyed you're still talking. The mockumentary format lets her deadpan asides land like small explosions, and the writing trusts her toughness to coexist with real tenderness toward her students, rather than using one to cancel out the other.