Queen Latifah was on hand to celebrate the opening of a school named after her late mother Rita Owens, Rita Owens STEAM Academy. The superstar rapper/actor made an appearance on Stephen Colbert's The Late Show, where she talked about why the endeavor was so important to her.

"My mother was an educator, she taught high school but she also taught life," Latifah said of her mother, who previously taught at Irvington High School. The new school is a satellite campus of the high school. "She taught love. She taught empowerment ... We have to have a lot of love and respect for our educators, they do so much. This is the first theme academy in Irvington, New Jersey so this is really the beginning of the future for these children that she loved so much."

In addition to opening the school, Latifah's drama thriller with Ludacris, End of the Road, is the #1 film on Netflix. The film follows Brenda (Latifah) as a widow who finds herself fighting to save her family against a killer during a road trip gone horribly wrong after witnessing a murder and finding a missing bag of cash. Ludacris plays her brother, Reggie, who joins her in the action.

Latifah can also be seen starring in the hit CBS show, The Equalizer. Check out her interview with Colbert above.