Six days ago, on December 4, the Florida Department of Education released its 2013-2014 teacher evaluations. These findings, which take into account student test scores and classroom evaluations, are useful for two reasons: 1) They provide parents with a comprehensive list that can help them choose the right school for their child's education, and 2) you can print the results out, slap them between two slices of honey wheat bread and eat it for lunch, because as far as I'm concerned these evaluations are bologna!
In the interest of transparency, I should disclose now that I am a proud alumni of Bayview Elementary, class of 2001. There I served as one of several ringleaders in the kindergarten circus (since discontinued after one of the kindergarten strongmen tested positive for Mountain Dew Code Red), and lost a 4th grade vice presidential election by the slimmest of margins.
But I can assure you that my association with Bayview Elementary will not affect my ability to form fair, unbiased opinions about these teacher evaluations.
That being said, these 2014 teacher evaluations make me want to slap a baby penguin in the face.
How did Bayview Elementary -- the school by the bay -- fall at number three in the Broward elementary school category? This is the same school whose faculty once assembled the entire 3rd, 4th, and 5th grade classes in an open field, organized them into the words "BAYVIEW 2000" and got them to stand still long enough for a goddamn helicopter to fly over and take a picture!
Do you realize how difficult that is? Have you ever met a nine-year-old? Getting 300 of them to do anything is impossible without a football field-length of Vicodin-infused Fruit Roll-Up.
And who could possibly knock Bayview Elementary from its rightful place at the top?
None other than Beachside Montessori Village and Davie Elementary School, coming in at number one and two respectively.
I'll give you a second to run to your nearest electronics store and purchase a new computer, because if you have any brain in your skull at all, you surely just punched a hole through your computer after hearing that.
Davie Elementary? Seriously? Apparently 18.8% of Davie Elementary's teachers qualified as "Highly Effective," which is odd, because I'm 99% sure that 57% of Davie's teaching staff is made up of farm animals.
It must be easy to educate the youth when the bulk of your curriculum focuses on goat etiquette.
One time, Davie Elementary took a field trip out to see the town battery. The kids are still talking about it.
But those tiny yokels over at Davie Elementary do not hold a candle (which is the only way they can see at night) to the insult that was Beachside Montessori Village beating Bayview for the top spot.
At least Davie Elementary is a school. Beachside Village is a Montessori program. Calling a Montessori program a school is like calling your omelet a chicken!
Maria Montessori was born in 1870, and was the first woman in Italy to receive a medical degree. She eventually went on to develop an education system that would be lauded by yoga-loving hippies for centuries to come.
Montessori is all about breaking down the strict barriers of education. There are no grades. Age groups blend together and kids work at their own pace, floating from subject to subject based on whatever interests them.
All this will be great if we ever start building hospitals out of Legos and curing diseases with boogers.
Look at this face. This face -- and thousands like it -- have passed through the halls of Bayview Elementary School, sipping Capri Suns and walking in geometrically perfect single file lines. And these latest teacher evaluations are a slap in the face to each and every one of these little toothless miracles, and the brave souls who taught them.
So next year get it right, Florida.
There is only one elementary school that belongs at the top of the list: Bayview, bitch.
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