Single Black Mom With 5 Children Graduates from Law School
(Atlanta, GA) Exclusive News: One morning nine years ago — at the height of her despair — Ieshia Champs thought about ending it all and driving her car off a freeway bridge after dropping her children off at daycare. Last week, Champs graduated from Texas Southern University’s Thurgood Marshall School of Law at the top of her class. And the Houston-based single mom — a former foster child and high school dropout — doesn’t have to look far to know what gave her the courage to go on.
A photo posted by one of her church leaders, Richard Holman, of Champs and her children holding “I Did It” and “We Did It” signs has now gone viral, shared nearly 2 million times — and counting — on social media.
At Champs’ law school hooding ceremony on May 11th, nobody cheered louder than David Jr., 14, Davien, 12, Khassidy, 11, Kaleb, 8, and E’mani, 5. “We’re so proud of our mom — she’s been our rock,” David Jr. tells IssueMatter. “She’s been an amazing role model for me and my sisters and brothers, and I’m so glad that she’s my mom.”
Hugging her kids after the graduation ceremony was the ultimate high for Champs, who experienced more tragedy than she thought she could bear back in 2009.
Her family lost everything in a house fire, her ex-husband died of cancer when she was seven months pregnant, her mother suffered a stroke, and Champs, then 24, lost her job as a Sprint customer service representative — all in less than a year.“I didn’t want to be bothered with the cares of the world any more,” she tells IssueMatter, “because it seemed as though nothing good would come my way. I tried to swerve off the freeway, but a car passed me so quickly that it scared me, and I kept driving and headed home. It still hurts today to think about it.”
