Mari Walker

As the Community & Education sections editor I wrote pages 16-25 of the May 2019 issue of Baton Rouge Parents Magazine . See the layout on the magazine's website . I also wrote Exceptional Lives: Making a Difference with Dressing .

After a grueling application process, Allen Duggar , a senior at Catholic High School (CHS), was chosen to represent Louisiana at the 2018-19 United States Senate Youth Program. Allen joined Louisiana senators Bill Cassidy and John Kennedy as one of the state’s two delegates in Washington, DC, for the annual program. Read the rest on the Baton Rouge Parents Magazine website .

Receiving a chronic illness diagnosis at age nine was devastating for Maddie Plauche. But in the five years since, she has used that experience to make wonderful things happen for others. Now 14 and an eighth grader at STEM Magnet Academy, Maddie continues to deal with ulcerative colitis (UC), an inflammatory bowel disease that causes great pain and requires almost constant access to a bathroom. “She is a master of disguise and hides her pain very well,” says Brent Plauche, Maddie’s father. Maddie says she has several friends who didn’t know anything was wrong until she told them. Read the rest on the Baton Rouge Parents Magazine website .

Karen Roy has lived most of her life in a wheelchair. When she was 19, she was shot in the back during an armed robbery, resulting in a complete T-10 spinal cord injury. After being told she would never walk again, Roy remembers her first question, “Can I still have children?” The answer she received was yes. “At that point of my life, all I really knew was that I wanted to be a mom. As long as I could do that, I would be fine,” she says. Roy is the mother of three young adults, Caroline, Austin and Joseph. She and her husband, Phillip, who passed away in 2016, were married for 20 years. Read the rest on t he Baton Rouge Parents Magazine website .

In my first issue as Community & Education sections editor, I wrote most of pages 16-21 and pages 22-25 of the April 2019 issue of Baton Rouge Parents Magazine . See the layout on the magazine's website . I also wrote Exceptional Lives: A Stand for Life, Independence and Health .

When Ella Barker ’s dad, Wayne, encouraged her to get into coding, he didn’t realize she would end up traveling to an international tech conference in middle school.  Ella, now 13, started her coding journey by participating in the Hour of Code, an event designed to demystify computer science and introduce kids to coding as part of Computer Science Education Week. Read the rest on the Baton Rouge Parents Magazine website .

As a mom of a first grader and preschooler, I spend A LOT of time in my car. Waiting in carpool line can seem interminable, especially with little miss who is passing time with me in the back seat. It wasn't really something I factored into our school decision, but it's become a fact of life. Unfortunately, it's one of my least favorite facts! As we wait, I can't help but start doing the math–making myself feel awful as I watch my life tick away one carpool at a time. If I average 20 minutes in line each day, that adds up to more than an hour and a half each week sitting in my car waiting–multiply it by the number of weeks of school and we're talking major time. At least once per week, I'm in line for a solid hour to be near the front and get my daughter early to make it to swim class on time. I'm lucky that my husband does the morning drop off most days, so that doesn't have to figure into my carpool calculus. But of course, I dwell o...