As a sixth-grade teacher, I once mentioned how much I loved Starbucks, and on the last day of school, one of my students surprised me with a gift card. I told him he didn’t have to, but he simply smiled and left.
When I tried to use it, the cashier scanned it, gasped, and called the manager, who asked where I had gotten it. He explained that a young boy wearing glasses had been coming into the store almost every week for a month, saving two or three dollars at a time from whatever money he had so he could buy a gift card for his teacher. He had told them I was the best teacher he had ever had. Overwhelmed by his kindness, I watched the manager slide the card back across the counter and insist that my coffee was free that day. It wasn’t the money on the gift card that touched my heart, but the love, gratitude, and effort a little boy had put into making his teacher feel special.
