She does more than just drive a SCHOOL BUS

Excerpt from www.oprah.com

Forty-five years after the "I Have a Dream" speech, ordinary citizens across the country are giving it all they've got to keep Dr. King's vision for a better future alive—including a Los Angeles bus driver named Tanya.

"About eight years ago, I was driving a rough route," she says. "Most of the kids on my bus were known for getting suspended, kicked out of school."

Recognizing their daily struggle, Tanya decided to try a special approach. "I learned to speak to my students everyday," she says. "I learned to smile at them, I learned to give them a hug if they needed a hug. I learned to give them encouragement, and from that I built trust."

With each day, Tanya became more and more invested in the future of her students. "I asked each one of them to show me their report card. And I was shocked to find out the majority of my students were failing," she says. "I said, 'How is it that I'm bringing you to school everyday and still you're failing? I don't understand.' I decided to challenge each student to bring up their grades."

Five weeks after Tanya's challenge, 54 of her students hit the books and improved their grades. As a reward, Tanya took them to a place they'd never been before—a marine biology cruise just a short ride away from the inner city.

"That was where a few of my students pulled me to the side and said, 'Miss Walters, I didn't realize there was a life outside my community,'" she says. "And that gave me the strength to know that I had a purpose in life."

Tanya says she decided to max out her credit cards, buy a bus and set out on a journey to expose teens to a world beyond their crime-ridden neighborhoods. "By having the opportunity to travel, now they're having the opportunity to dream, and they're able to see that there is a place out there for [them] somewhere. Not just [their] community," Tanya says.

In 2006, Tanya enlisted the help of fellow bus drivers and volunteers to start Godparents Youth Organization so she could offer her classroom on wheels to children all over America. In just a few years, Tanya has taken students to America's most important civil rights landmarks and museums across 26 states.

Tanya says understanding where they come from helps the kids envision brighter futures. "They're able to link history together, and I think that's what our youth need right now is to know that people came from all walks of background and [have] struggled for all different reasons."

Sixteen-year-old Shamika had little hope for the future when she took her first road trip with Tanya, but she says she gained a whole new perspective. "This really opened my eyes and explained to me what my morals should be. It put my priorities back in order," she says. "Most of my friends over here are gangbangers. They're caught up into this lifestyle. Martin Luther King, he never showed any type of violence, and if he can do it—if he can do it—I can do it."

On her most recent bus trip, Shamika acted as a mentor for younger children. "They do count on me to step up and be a leader and let the other kids that are new know right from wrong," Shamika says.

Tanya believes her greatest victory has been helping young people like Shamika. "They go through life, and they think that they can't achieve. They think that they won't amount to anything. And it's not such!" Tanya says. "My goal, when I bring our kids together, is for them to dream again, for them to bring back hope. Because when you have hope, you have determination."