Penny Stevens of Godwin High School
Mills E. Godwin High School health and physical education teacher Penny Stevens believes there are others who are more worthy of attention than she is.
“I don’t deserve this,” she says when contacted for this story. “I am honored — and I mean that with a capital H-O-N-O-R-E-D — that I get to work with such a caliber of people at all levels: administrative, teachers, custodians … everyone. Then you throw in some of the most loving, caring, compassionate and thoughtful students, and then I get to meet their parents. I am blessed.”
Those who have experienced Stevens’ particular brand of service to the school and its occupants over the last 24 years say she is one of a kind: someone who finds a way to interact with others, especially teenagers, so that they feel seen and supported.
“Penny is the type of person who makes sure that everyone around her knows how special they are,” Godwin Principal Leigh Dunavant says. “She is going to know who you are, know your name, know what you like. Her relationship-building is fantastic. She is connected to every single person she meets.”
Stevens, the mother of five adult children, first came to Godwin as a parent. She was an active volunteer in her children’s schools and was always present when they played sports. In 1998, Godwin’s then-principal, John B. McGinty, who knew Stevens was a single mother at the time, offered her a position as an instructional assistant in the school’s special education department. Stevens jumped at the chance for a steady job that provided health insurance. As she worked, she sought her teaching recertification — she had a master’s degree in health and PE and taught before having children — so she was ready to apply for a full-time teaching position when one opened two years later. Over the years, she also took on the job of athletic game monitor, which means she’s at the school in the evenings, too, helping coaches, students and visitors enjoy Godwin athletics.
“I’m here by 8 a.m. and usually get home by 9 p.m.; spring has longer days,” she says. “It’s not crazy to me because it’s what I love.”
Earlier this fall, Stevens was surprised when the Godwin Athletic Association, the group that raises money to support school athletics, unveiled a new golf cart emblazoned with “Penny’s Pride” on the front hood. Allison Unowitz, GAA president, says the donation was meant to honor Stevens’ dedication to the school in a practical way; the school previously had only one cart, which is busy every day, transporting gear, injured athletes and people with mobility issues.
Stevens takes a spin in Penny’s Pride at a recent football game.
“Penny Stevens has been a staple at Godwin,” Unowitz says. “She knows every kid by name. She’s at every sporting event. She’s there all year — winter, fall, spring. The golf cart was something we wanted to give to the school to always remember Penny Stevens by.”
“I did not see that coming,” Stevens says. “I was truly overwhelmed.”
While most people encounter Stevens as she’s performing her after-school duties, her real impact is in the classroom, Principal Dunavant says, noting that the 10th grade curriculum includes both the county’s abstinence-based family education and suicide prevention.
“She’s not afraid to talk about anything,” Dunavant says. “She is totally transparent and straightforward. And she’s not afraid to help somebody through something hard.”
Stevens agrees that, alongside her goal of teaching the importance and benefits of healthy lifestyles, she wants to support students when times are tough.
“There’s a lot going on with these young people that we didn’t necessarily have to experience,” she says. “I just want them to be happy and healthy and proud of who they are. I try very hard to prove to them that they can trust me.
“I’ve had quite a few students come and open their hearts to me when they weren’t in a good place,” she says. “I feel very honored they trust me enough with personal information.”
Her help goes beyond the classroom, too, says Godwin counselor Amy Gravely.
“If [students] come to Penny, she’s going to be there for them,” Gravely says. “She will sit with them, listen to them and let them know she cares. If the next step is school-based mental health services, she will walk with them and be with them for as long as they want her there.
“It’s hard to be a teenager,” Gravely adds. “Penny is often the person students can have their first adult conversations with, then they can go on to have conversations with other adults. There’s a value in having those conversations with an objective, caring adult who’s not [their] parent.”
Stevens is also good with colleagues, Dunavant says. “Penny is a confidant for the adults in this building, too,” she says. “She has the best listening ear and will talk with you about anything. It always feels really good to talk with Penny about something that is bothering you.”
Stevens starts every day with a prayer, asking for help to provide what is needed by the people around her. That might mean congratulating a student who has a solo in a school performance. Or it might mean helping a grandparent, watching from a distance, find a grandchild on the field; calling a student-athlete at home after an injury; or simply taking a student’s younger sibling for a ride in the golf cart. All of it matters, she says.
“The kids feed my soul,” she says. “I tell them every day how much I love them. I teach as if every one of them were my own. I tell them that if someone offered me a job making $100,000 a year — which isn’t what a teacher makes — I would be humbled and appreciative, but there’s no amount of money that would make me leave here.”
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