Get stories like this delivered straight to your inbox. Sign up for the LA School Report newsletter.

Belmont High teacher Cassandra McGrath, via LA Weekly

“When you were a kid you imagined that your teachers lived in closets and subsisted on coffee grinds and eraser gum,” notes this LA Weekly item (Cassandra McGrath’s Stories to Make You Cry).  Instead, the 28 year-old teacher has published an anthology of stories called “Rising From The Ashes,” featuring the work of former Belmont High School students, and also released an album that includes songs about her students.