It wasn’t all bad
■■ A passing delivery driver helped a man escape from a burning building. Sean Campbell was carrying packages for Amazon in a Florida suburb when he heard the sound of screams. He ran toward the sound and discovered that a fire in a house’s garage was quickly growing, with an elderly man still inside. Campbell ran in and found the man in his kitchen, searching for his walker. The 23-year-old driver quickly helped him outside. Tim West, the rescued man’s son, praised Campbell for being “brave enough” to run in. “It was fantastic,” West said.
■■ Zoom school is becoming just a little more bearable, thanks to a new viral trend. Many instructors find student participation lagging during remote classes, so when a teacher made a TikTok video of herself plastering a sticker on her face each time a student spoke up, the idea quickly caught on. “My students loved it. They were laughing, and I had never had all 18 of my students completely engaged in my math lesson,” said Taylor Dale. By the end of a class, some teachers’ faces are covered in stars, dots, or characters. “It’s a way to block out all the craziness with something fun,” said Krista Coletti.
■■ Last month Chris Kennedy and 4-year-old daughter Emily decorated their lawn with Christmas cheer, including their inflatable Black Santa. Then, they received a hateful anonymous note telling them to remove it because Santa Claus has been a white man “for the past 600 years.” Shocked, Kennedy shared the letter on Facebook. Soon, in solidarity, their neighbors began putting up Black Santas—so many that retailers are selling out. “The outpouring of love, support, and unity that we’re seeing from the community has just been incredible,” said Kennedy. “At the end of the day, what was meant for evil was flipped for good.”