Earlier this year bus driver Renita Smith saved 20 children from a school bus fire after the engine burst into flames. A mother herself, Smith refers to her passengers as ‘my babies’ because she believes it is her responsibility to protect them as if they truly were her own children. When people called her a hero she humbly told them she was simply a mother doing what any mother would have done. When Ellen learned that Renita was a single mother living paycheck-to-paycheck, the beloved talk show host decided it was time someone rewarded Smith for her selfless act of bravery.