One fourth grade student’s backpack was quite literally the cat’s meow.

Fourth grade teacher Carey Geipel started looking around her classroom after she heard meowing during a planning period March 16 only to discover a student brought a cat to school hidden in a backpack, according to a Facebook post.

"We listen to a purse, lunchbox... it must be a cell phone ringing," she wrote. "Nope. It's coming from the backpacks. I lift a jacket and a backpack MOVES. I unzip the backpack and a cat's head POPS out!"

Geipel made a phone call home to the student’s mother, who came and picked up the cat.

“Hello, Student is safe but we have kind of a weird situation,” Geipel wrote, recounting the conversation. “Your student brought a cat to school, on the bus, in her backpack.”

It turns out it is not even their cat, it belongs to their neighbor.

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Travelers walk around the baggage claim in the South Terminal at Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport on Thursday, Nov. 6, 2025. Atlanta is among the airports where the FAA will reduce flights due to the shutdown, and airports are facing a shortage of air traffic controllers. 
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Credit: Miguel Martinez-Jimenez