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This teacher promised to always support her students — years later she went the extra mile.

Being an educator is a profession, but most people who choose to be teachers aren’t there for the money.

Their career choice comes from a deep need to nurture and develop their students and communities.

Recently, Chicago teacher LaShonda Carter showed how being an educator goes well beyond what happens in the classroom.

Carter was up late on the morning of August 23rd and received a message on Facebook from Larresha Plummer, 18, a former student at Harper High School. “We always talk, even though I left Harper, I still keep in contact with all of my students,” Carter said told CNN.

[rebelmouse-image 19346098 dam="1" original_size="1200x624" caption="Photo by LasShonda Carter/GoFundMe" expand=1]Photo by LasShonda Carter/GoFundMe

Plummer has a three-week old baby named Taliyah and was struggling to get by. She wanted to attend a job fair the next day, but didn’t have a ride or anyone to babysit.

“There was no way I would have let her take a baby in a bus, I told her right away that I would pick her up in the morning,” Carter told CNN.

Hours later, Carter picked up Plummer and Taliyah and drove them to the job fair. She sat with the baby in her car while Plummer filled out job applications. Carter posted a video on Facebook to ask for help for Plummer and her baby.

“I’m reaching out because I need you alls help. I need my village because this beautiful little baby needs some things,” Carter said. “I'm going to do what I can as much as I can as an educator.”

The Heart of Educator Pt.2 (I need your help)
Posted by LaShonda Carter on Thursday, August 23, 2018

After the job fair, Carter took Plummer to apply for Women, Infants, and Children (WIC), to get some milk for Taliyah.

She also started a GoFundMe page for additional help.

She also gave some important advice to her former student at a pivotal time in her life.

“My previous student needs to know she can still be successful, even though she's a teenage mother. A teenage mother does not equal failure,” she wrote on Facebook.

According to Carter, Plummer now has a job and is looking to attend college in the fall.

Carter’s actions are just another example why educators are a vital part of our communities. And why real communities, where people look out for each other, are so important.

“As an educator, it goes beyond the classroom. There are things that nobody ever knows that educators do,” she wrote on Facebook.

Pop Culture

Folks are admitting that Boomers weren’t totally wrong. Here are 19 things they got right.

OK, Boomer, you're right about this one.

via Patrick Lannigan/Flickr

The gaze of the approving Boomer.

Over the past few years, Baby Boomers (1946 to 1964) have been getting a lot of grief from the generations that came after them, Gen X (1965 to 1980), Millenials (1981 to 1996), and now, Gen Z (1997 to 2012). Their grievances include environmental destruction, wealth hoarding, political polarization, and being judgemental when they don’t understand how hard it is for younger people to make it in America these days.

Every Baby Boomer is different, so it's wrong to paint them all with a broad brush. But it’s undeniable that each generation shares common values, and some are bound to come into conflict.

However, life in 2023 isn’t without its annoyances. Many that came about after the technological revolution put a phone in everyone’s hands and brought a whole new host of problems. Add the younger generations' hands-on approach to child rearing and penchant for outrage, and a lot of moden life has become insufferanble.

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baby boomers

Pop Culture

Little boy steals the show at his sister's end-of-year dance school concert

This kid was born to dance.

@kleinkwagga1/TikTok

Klein Kwagga understood the assignment at his sister's concert.

Some kids are too shy to ever want to get on a stage, some will spend most of a performance staring awkwardly at their shoes, and some kids love the opportunity to show off what they've practiced in front of an audience.

And then there are the kids were simply born for the spotlight. You know them when you see them.

When Dirkco Jansen van Nieuwenhuizen hopped on stage with all of the other brothers and sisters of the dance students at René’s Art of Dance in South Africa, no one expected a viral sensation. According to Capetown Etc, it was the school's year-end concert, and siblings were invited to come up and dance to Bernice West’s Lyfie—a popular song in Afrikaans. And Dirkco, who goes by Klein Kwagga, took the assignment and ran with it.

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dance

Community

People share the most practical ways to support new parents after giving birth

Sometimes the best gift is practicality.

Photo by Kelly Sikkema on Unsplash

People share the most practical ways to support new parents

There's a lot of preparation that goes into having a child well before they're even born. First there are the physical changes your body makes to clear up some space for a tiny human roughly the size of a watermelon. Then there's preparing the nursery, buying lots of extremely small clothes, diapers and an expected understanding that while sleep may be your friend, you won't be getting any of it for about a year.

Lots of people give plenty of advice to help you cope in the early days but after the baby arrives, the focus shifts to solely the baby. It's obviously not a deliberate shift. Babies are just more shiny and new that the parents. But not everyone forgets about the parents once baby makes their grand entrance–some go out of their way to make sure the parents feel supported.

Upworthy asked its audience, "what was the best non-baby related gift you received as a new parent," and the answers were a masterclass on how to care for new parents.

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postpartum gifts

Identity

Formerly enslaved man's response to his 'master' wanting him back is a literary masterpiece

"I would rather stay here and starve — and die, if it come to that — than have my girls brought to shame by the violence and wickedness of their young masters."

GOOD

A photo of Jordan Anderson.

In 1825, at the approximate age of 8, Jordan Anderson (sometimes spelled "Jordon") was sold into slavery and would live as a servant of the Anderson family for 39 years. In 1864, the Union Army camped out on the Anderson plantation and he and his wife, Amanda, were liberated. The couple eventually made it safely to Dayton, Ohio, where, in July 1865, Jordan received a letter from his former owner, Colonel P.H. Anderson. The letter kindly asked Jordan to return to work on the plantation because it had fallen into disarray during the war.

On Aug. 7, 1865, Jordan dictated his response through his new boss, Valentine Winters, and it was published in the Cincinnati Commercial. The letter, entitled "Letter from a Freedman to His Old Master," was not only hilarious, but it showed compassion, defiance, and dignity. That year, the letter would be republished in theNew York Daily Tribune and Lydia Marie Child's "The Freedman's Book."

The letter mentions a "Miss Mary" (Col. Anderson's Wife), "Martha" (Col. Anderson's daughter), Henry (most likely Col. Anderson's son), and George Carter (a local carpenter).

Dayton, Ohio,
August 7, 1865
To My Old Master, Colonel P.H. Anderson, Big Spring, Tennessee

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history

This teacher promised to always support her students — years later she went the extra mile.

Being an educator is a profession, but most people who choose to be teachers aren’t there for the money.

“There was no way I would have let her take a baby in a bus, I told her right away that I would pick her up in the morning,” Carter told CNN.

According to Carter, Plummer now has a job and is looking to attend college in the fall.

OK, Boomer, you're right about this one.

1. App exhaustion​

2. Let kids play

3. Pricey concerts

4. Tip creep

5. Phones at concerts

6. Kids online

7. Lazy tablet parents

8. Bring back knobs

9. Bad customer service

10. Raising entitled kids

11. Emojis in work emails

12. Paper straws

13. Face tattoos

14. Gender reveals

15. People are too sensitive

16. TV sounds terrible

17. Affordable housing

18. Blinded by the lights

19. The people on your lawn

This kid was born to dance.

The 42-year-old optical illusion is still astounding people.

Sometimes the best gift is practicality.

1. Everyone has to eat, especially when you've just birthed a human

2. Cleaning is a gift of love

3. Giving parents a much needed break from their littles to do wild things like nap.

Too many women lose out on much needed support because of unwarranted stigma.

"I would rather stay here and starve — and die, if it come to that — than have my girls brought to shame by the violence and wickedness of their young masters."

1. App exhaustion