There are plenty of cult-classic movies out there (The Princess Bride, Pulp Fiction, Fight Club, etc.), I have a hunch there are way more cult-classic television shows. I'm kind of embarrassed to say this, but one show that falls into this category for me is Saved By The Bell.

If the show ever gets brought up in conversation, the majority of the discussion revolves around the main characters of Zach, Kelly, Slater, Jesse, Screech, and Lisa. (Usually Zach and Kelly.) However, as much as I enjoyed the corny acting, cheesy situations, and all around nutty solutions, I personally thought the secondary characters made the show great...especially the teachers.

Did you know that you can go to ratemyteacher.com and find fictional Bayside High in the registry? Crazy...huh? Well, I also found a fun little cheat sheet of minor characters that lists all the teachers from SBTB on wikipedia. I'm including an excerpt from that site for you to browse and am curious which teacher you liked best. My allegiance is torn between Mrs. Simpson and Mr. Dewey. (BTW, this list isn't exausitive. Feel free to add others to the list.)

Mrs. Culpepper

Mrs. Culpepper was the school’s art teacher and made appearances in both junior year and the paradoxical Tori season during senior year. She was always involved in comical situations in which she bumped into lockers and mistook inanimate objects for living things due to her bad eyesight. At one point she even accidentally made Mr. Belding think she was in love with him, which completely flustered her.

Mr. Dewey

Mr. Dewey (Patrick T. O'Brien) was a math teacher who also oversaw detention. He represented the quintessential down-on-his-luck, more-bored-than-the-kids depressed teacher. He spoke in a monotonous voice, was sarcastic and also once competed on American Gladiators. He was also Bayside's vice-principal. Mr. Dewey also appeared in the New Class.

Mr. Heimlich

Mr. Heimlich appeared in one episode ("Earthquake!") as the physics teacher. Since the episode revolved primarily around the Mrs. Belding's baby and the earthquake, he did not have a very large part.

Rod Belding

Rod Belding was Mr. Belding’s brother, and stepped in as a substitute teacher during junior year. He initially made a hip impression on the students because of his happy-go-lucky attitude, world-weary demeanor, and tales of defying authority and schoolwork. Mr. Belding was overshadowed by his brother’s connection with the students, which was evident in a minor confrontation they had when Mr. Belding tells his brother he is not to be teaching the kids whitewater rafting on official class time. However, Rod arranged to take the students on a whitewater rafting trip for their annual class trip (ruining Mr. Belding's plans to visit Yosemite Park), and then skipped out to meet a stewardess named Inga. Mr. Belding is furious that Rod would abandon his commitment to the students and orders him never to come back to Bayside saying, "Get out of my school". Mr. Belding then lies to the students that his brother is ill, but the students ask him to chaperone the whitewater rafting and he happily agrees to do so. Zack, who was aware of the incident, confided in Mr. Belding that “we got the better Belding”.

Nurse Jennifer

Nurse Jennifer (played by Nancy Valen) was a school nurse that showed up during sophomore year to replace Nurse “Blind-as-a-bat” Butcher. Zack decided to scrap his plans for a steady relationship with Kelly in order to pursue a romance with Jennifer. However, Jennifer was aware of the plot and managed to frighten Zack away by coming on to him and saying that she needed to escape her violent husband who is a professional wrestler (which may or may not have been true). Nurse Jennifer was never again seen in Bayside after this episode.

Mrs. Simpson

Mrs. Simpson was the nearly-deaf, British-accented teacher who taught English class. She also appeared at the beginning of junior year and embarrassed Kelly and Zack by referring to them as “Bayside’s Most Beloved Couple” just a short while after they broke up. She said she didn't like Zack, and once wore a hearing aid that she discarded because the titual bell caused painful sound waves to assault her. She also made an appearance in “The New Class”.

Coach Sonski

Coach Sonski (played by comedian Monty Hoffman) was the wrestling coach at Bayside High. Slightly overweight and with a testosterone-laden personality, he was generally a good coach, if a bit sexist. He depended on Slater as his star wrestler.

"Coach" Sonski was also shown as Bayside's autoshop instructor in the episode where Jessie's new stepbrother comes to California. He retains his sense of humor as well as his testosterone-laden personality throughout the episodes.

Mr. Dickerson

Played by Raf Mauro, Dickerson was a history teacher known for his unfriendly demeanor and an impossible midterm that no student had passed in three years, something which he stupidly referred to with pride instead of noticing it meant he was a horrible teacher. In the episode known as "The Fabulous Belding Brothers," Dickerson has a nervous breakdown and is replaced by the very popular Rod Belding.

Mr. Tuttle

Played by Jack Angeles, Tuttle was an enthusiastic, overweight teacher (perhaps a foil for the thin, dour Mr. Dewey). He also oversaw, among other things, Driver’s Ed and the Glee Club. His relationship with Mr. Belding was strained and confrontational--with Belding mainly on the receiving end of his barbs. It was revealed in the "Driver's Ed." episode that Mr. Tuttle was next in line to Mr. Belding for the principal job and even had "the colors for the office all picked out," thus creating tension between them. He once dubbed the principal "Mr. Balding".

He appeared sporadically throughout the seasons and was on the forefront of the teacher’s strike during senior year as head of the teacher's union. It's also worth noting that Mr. Tuttle was one of the few teachers who actually liked and admired Zack Morris, often delighting in Zack's clever schemes (e.g. "Wow! Good plan!").

Ms. Wentworth

Played by Carol Lawrence, Ms. Wentworth was the Social Studies teacher during sophomore year who piqued Zack’s interest in his family heritage by assigning a family research project. She also taught the class about subliminal advertising, which led to a predictably hair-brained scheme from Zack. Ms. Wentworth is one of Bayside's more enthusiastic and unorthodox teachers, climbing on desks and cracking playful jokes in class.

Like Mr. Tuttle, she is one of the few teachers who genuinely seems to like Zack--even as she teaches him a lesson.

George Testaverde

Mr. Testaverde taught a history class in the episode "The Gift". He was nicknamed "Terrible" Testaverde by the students because he was one of the hardest teachers at Bayside. Not only was he tough on grading and exams, but he gave lectures in "speed talk", causing Jessie to almost set fire to the papers she wrote on, and Screech to write with both hands. Both Jessie and Screech actually tried to keep up, but Zack totally ignored the lecture and listened to music instead. He was played by John Moschitta.

©Wikipedia 2009, used in accordance to the GNU Free Documentation License.