Professionally, Penny has been a parent educator in a variety of settings for almost 30 years. She began her career as a social worker in the Child Protective Services field, working with birth families as well as with foster and adoptive parents. After moving from Canada to California in 1977, she coordinated a school-based counseling program serving high risk children and their families, as well as providing training for students, administrators and parents, for a non-profit agency. She then developed and implemented another school-based program at the same agency, providing classes for pregnant and parenting teens.
Penny has been an adjunct faculty member in the Child Development Department of a community college since 1986, where she now teaches a full semester ‘Parent-Child Interaction’ class. Currently, she also holds a full time position at a second community college as Director of the Foster and Kinship Care Education program. This program provides continuing education classes for licensed foster parents, kinship providers and others.
As a Parent Educator/Consultant and Certified Positive Discipline Associate, Penny has provided many workshops and classes for parents, teachers, child care providers, early childhood staff, social workers, community organizations and others on topics pertinent to living and working with children. Participants in her seminars describe her as "passionate, caring, dynamic, knowledgeable and definitely fun."
Personally, Penny has two daughters, now adults, and was a single parent during most of their growing-up years. She remarried in 2001, and now has two adult stepchildren and 2 grandsons. She and her husband reside in southern California.
Penny earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in Sociology from the University of Alberta, in Edmonton, Canada., and received her Master of Arts degree in Human Development from Pacific Oaks College in Pasadena, California.