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Janitor has an incredible reaction to being gifted his dream Jeep by high school students

The students wanted to help the man because he was a "friend to all of us."

via GoFundMe

Students at James Madison Highschool with their janitor, Francis Apraku.

It’s not uncommon for the most likable person at any school to be the janitor. They’re the person the students can rely on whenever they’ve kicked a ball onto the roof or left their jacket in a locked classroom. They’re also right on top of things whenever there’s a nasty spill in the cafeteria or a leak in a classroom roof.

Simply put, schools can’t run without their janitorial staff.

One special janitor at a high school in Virginia was surprised when the students went out of their way to get him his dream car. “He’s more than just a custodian. He’s a dear friend to all of us. He’s just a very kind, genuine person,” one of the students said, according to KBTX.

In May 2024, some freshman students at James Madison High School in Vienna, Virginia, asked their favorite janitor, Francis Apraku, what he wanted for his birthday. He said his dream gift would be a Jeep Wrangler. "So, he told us his birthday's coming up and he told us he really wanted a Jeep and that was his dream car. That was his end goal in life, which was to get a Jeep Wrangler, and he was totally set. So we thought, 'We're gonna try to get him a Jeep,’" a student who helped organize the campaign said, according to WUSA 9.

Apraku came to the United States from Ghana, a country in West Africa located on the Coast of Guinea, 10 years ago.



The boys put together a GoFundMe campaign with the goal of getting their favorite janitor a Jeep by the time they graduated high school in four years. Little did they know they would have raised enough money in six months to make his dreams come true.

“We are freshmen at James Madison High School in Virginia and our favorite custodian, Francis, loves Jeep Wranglers. He moved to America away from his family and friends a few years ago. Ever since we met Francis, he has been super kind and friendly and sometimes even says prayers for us,” the students wrote on the GoFundMe page.

“We were talking to him today about what he would want for his birthday and he said he has always wanted a Jeep Wrangler but could never afford it, which is why we made this GoFundMe to try and raise enough to get Francis a Jeep Wrangler by the time we graduate. Any and all donations are very appreciated,” the post concluded.

The boys set a goal of $20,000, and they eclipsed it on September 7, 2024, so it was time to get Apraku his Jeep. The students bought the car with the help of Andy, a local car dealer.

- YouTubewww.youtube.com

When the students brought Apraku to the school parking lot to show him his new red Jeep, he couldn’t believe his eyes. He fell to the ground and began rolling all over the ground. “Oh my God, Oh my God,” he said. “I don’t believe this is happening in my life…I give thanks to Almighty God for making today for me.”

Rewarding their favorite custodian was also a dream come true for the students. “I’m excited to see him whipping it around school, seeing him every day... He really deserves it,” one student said.



"We just kind of decided we were going to try to get him his Jeep Wrangler with the GoFundMe, and we never really thought that it would come this far," Logan Georgelas, one of the students who set up the FoFuneMe campaign, said according to Fox 5. "When we got $5,000 in the first day, we were like, all right, this is real."

After taking his first spin behind the wheel of his new Jeep, Apraku was impressed. "It's very, very fantastic. Very nice one,” he said, according to WUSA 9. He also had kind words for the community that bought him his new wheels. “So I would say thanks to [the students behind the GoFundMe] and especially the parents involved. Also, may God bless them.”

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After losing his son to suicide, this Virginia senator knew he needed to act.

Sen. Creigh Deeds of Virginia understands the importance of mental health care better than most.

In the midst of a mental health crisis, he was stabbed by his son Gus 13 times on Nov. 19, 2013, before Gus shot himself and died by suicide.  Deeds survived the attack, dumbfounded by what happened.

The day before the incident, a judge had issued an emergency custody order to place Gus in a mental health facility. But due to a bed shortage, he was released after just six hours.

It was a tragedy — and one that should have been prevented. Gus and his father were close. During Deeds' 2009 run for governor, Gus was a mainstay at Deeds' campaign events. His violent outburst seemed out of character to everyone, including Deeds.

Deeds hugs his son on election night 2009. Photo by Win McNamee/Getty Images.

In the wake of his son's death, Deeds set out to fix Virginia's mental health system — and this July, a law he championed went into effect.

Virginia and New York have both enacted legislation to require schools to include mental health-related issues as part of physical education and health courses. Virginia will mandate the development of a mental health curriculum for high schools, while New York will require it to be covered throughout K-12 classes.

In 2014, Deeds introduced a bill to double the maximum amount of time people could be held on emergency custody orders (12 hours, up from six), as well as creating a more streamlined communications process between law enforcement and local community services boards. That bill was signed into law by Gov. Terry McAuliffe.

Photo by Drew Angerer/Getty Images.

Mental health is just as important as physical health, and we don't devote nearly enough resources to it.

The overwhelming majority of people who struggle with mental health problems won't commit a violent act like Gus Deeds. In fact, people with mental illness are more likely to be the victims of violent crime than they are to be the perpetrators.

It's worth noting this because the stereotype of mentally ill people committing horrific acts of violence is prevalent and reinforces stigma surrounding it, putting barriers up to people who might otherwise seek help. (Obviously, as Gus Deeds' situation shows, this isn't to say that no people with mental illness will commit crimes.)

According to the National Alliance on Mental Illness, 1 in 5 teens and young adults live with one or more mental health conditions. Half of those will have developed it by the age of 14.

If we want to do more about this issue, we need people to feel safe and comfortable asking for help. The answer isn't to lock people away, but to try to intervene in conditions that only get worse over time.

Working mental health education into school curricula is one small step toward eliminating stigma.

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This school showed the power of a simple name change when confronting a racist legacy.

This school is teaching an important lesson.

The last public building in Virginia's capital with a Confederate name is getting a makeover. Thanks, Obama.

On June 18, the Richmond School District voted 6-1 to change the name of J.E.B Stuart Elementary to Barack Obama Elementary.

Why does that matter?

Stuart was a U.S. Army officer who switched sides to join the Confederacy during the Civil War and became one of the South's top military strategists. Richmond school officials wanted to let go of inappropriately honoring a pro-slavery leader, and do so in a way that built bridges in the community.

"It's incredibly powerful that in the capital of the Confederacy, where we had a school named for an individual who fought to maintain slavery, that now we're renaming that school after the first black president," Richmond Public School Superintendent Jason Kamras said. "A lot of our kids, and our kids at J.E.B. Stuart, see themselves in Barack Obama."

The elementary school body is 95% African-American and a number of school leaders suggested swapping out Stuart's name for Obama's, echoing a similar move at a Mississippi elementary school in 2017.

The fight over replacing Confederate monuments has been divisive, but it doesn't have to be.

The name change in Richmond was also partially a response to the infamous white nationalist marches in Charlottesville, Virginia in 2017 in which one protester was killed and 19 others were injured during a contentious debate over a park named after the Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee.

Students were polled on how they would like to see the school renamed and school district officials discussed the issue before moving forward.

Even though the debate was mild, Obama himself might chuckle at the fact that he was only the student's third favorite choice, losing out in a school wide poll to the more generic "Northside Elementary" (named after the school's location) and "Wishtree Elementary" named after the popular children's book celebrating cultural diversity.

At the end of the day, any of those names would be a preferable alternative, but there's something wonderful about directly countering the Confederate legacy with one that tells a positive story about our nation's evolution on race.

America continues to grapple with public ties to our history of racism and oppression. This is a great step forward.

The debate over our complicated racial history isn't going away. We can't ignore our past, and wins like this are simple ways to bridge the divide.

It's time to move beyond honoring ideas and leaders who no longer reflect the values this nation holds dear.

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An evangelical scientist shows 'Full Frontal' how to talk to climate change doubters.

Fewer than half of Americans think climate change will pose a threat to their way of life within their lifetimes.

They should hear about Tangier Island.

The island, located in the Chesapeake Bay off the coast of Virginia's mainland, is quite literally sinking into the sea. Since 1850, its land mass has decreased by two-thirds, and scientific estimates suggest that within the next half century, it'll be completely uninhabitable.

Tangier Mayor James Eskridge insists that the real issue is erosion. Appearing at a CNN town hall with former Vice President Al Gore, Eskridge asked why he hadn't noticed any signs of rising sea levels — even as his island sinks into the sea.

On Tangier Island, however, Esktridge's view is far from uncommon.

"Full Frontal With Samantha Bee" correspondent Allana Harkin recently traveled to Tangier Island.

Along the way, she learned a few techniques for having productive conversations with climate change doubters.

Many of Tangier's residents are evangelical Christians, a group that is made up of some of the statistically least likely Americans to believe in man-made climate change. Some residents interviewed rolled their eyes at Harkin when she stated that she believed in things like climate change and evolution, and others suggested that even if climate change is real, it's fine because they'll be raptured away.

A Tangier resident named George has no interest in hearing what Al Gore has to say about climate change. All images via Full Frontal With Samantha Bee/YouTube.

Unable to get through to residents using conventional arguments, Harkin turned to Dr. Katherine Hayhoe, a climate scientist and evangelical Christian, for help.

"Just saying, 'Oh, God will take care of it' or 'It doesn't matter,' is actually a profoundly un-Christian perspective," said Hayhoe — who has a positive track record of getting through to doubtful evangelicals on this subject — in the segment. "In the Bible, it says God will destroy those who destroy the Earth."

When Harkin asked what steps she could take to convince those who dispute climate science on the basis of religious grounds, Hayhoe highlighted the importance of listening, not just lecturing, and asking for their stories.

"Rather than coming and in and saying, 'I know,' 'I'm gonna tell you,' 'You listen to me,' the place to start is by sharing from the heart: What is it that we have in common?"

Katherine Hayhoe delivers a talk on rebutting climate change denial among evangelicals.

With Hayhoe's advice in mind, Harkin revisited the first group, and, well, it went sorta kinda OK!

This time, instead of challenging their entire worldviews, Harken tried a different tactic. "Let me throw this out there, and we'll let it land. We won't even have to discuss it," Harkin said. "What if climate scientists are actually doing God's work?" The room was stunned into silence. You could practically see the exact moment the walls of distrust started to come down.

Addressing the question in a way that made sense with their view of the world elicited a stunned, thoughtful silence and some nods from the group. "He works through everybody," said one man. "Yeah, He can work through them," said another, nodding.

Harkin moderates a discussion among Tangier residents.

Though the segment ends without any converts to the side of truth, science, and not standing by as their island disappears forever, Harkin and the Tangier Island residents had an important conversation that could signal the first steps in saving the island from the effects of climate change.

Watch the "What's Happening to Tangier Island" segment from "Full Frontal With Samantha Bee" below.

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