It Takes A Village: Teacher Sits In Car With Former Student’s Newborn While She Attends Job Fair

Chicago teacher LaShonda Carter has always said to students that if they ever needed her, she would always be there. Well, Ms. Carter didn’t disappoint one of her former students, three years after being in her class.

One evening, Carter was having trouble sleeping when she began chatting with 18-year-old Larresha Plummer on Facebook. Plummer began telling her former teacher how she has been having a rough time and wanted to attend a job fair but didn’t have a way to get there.

Plummer had just had a baby and didn’t want to take her 3-week-old baby on public transportation. “There was no way I would have let her take a baby in a bus,” Carter said. “I told her right away that I would pick her up in the morning.”

Carter picked up Plummer and her baby to take the teen to the job fair. The teacher stayed in the car with the newborn while Plummer applied for jobs.

After the teen applied for jobs, Carter took her to apply for Women, Infants, and Children (WIC), a program that helps mothers in need obtain support for nutritional foods for themselves and their children.

In a Facebook post, Carter stated, “Sometimes as a teacher, our jobs go beyond the classroom.” The teacher then went on to ask her Facebook friends to assist the teen in any way that they can. “She’s a young teenage mom, and she needs some help. I’m gonna do what I can, as much as I can as an educator, but know I can’t do it all by myself.”

According to the teen’s former teacher, Plummer now has a job and plans to attend college this fall.