Libby Woodham and her mother Shawn Woodham talk about her life and the importance of loving what you do

00:03 Hi, my name is Libby and I'm 17 years old. And today is November 26, 2023. I'm speaking with my mom, and her name is Sean. We're recording in Vestavia Hills, Alabama, at our house. So, mom, when and where were you born? Did you grow up there? And what was it like growing up there?

00:21 Okay. I was born in 1977 in. In Tuscaloosa. I spent the first 18 years of my life there. Growing up there. I went to Weston Christian Elementary, Western Christian. It was a private school. I went kindergarten through fourth grade there. Then I changed and went to public school in fifth. I went to Inglewood elementary, fifth and sixth. Then I went to Hillcrest High School from seventh through 12th. It was a. It was a school that's now a middle school and a high school, but then was 7th through 12th. So we. It was a school meant for only 300, and I think we had a thousand in there.

01:14 Wow.

01:15 It was so packed that seventh graders had to eat their lunch outside. So I ate my lunch outside every day, except when it was really, really cold. They let us eat in the hallways.

01:25 How nice of them. So how many did you graduate with?

01:29 I only graduated 149.

01:31 Okay.

01:32 But it was a growing area of the town, and so they just could not. When I was in seventh and eighth grade, they just could not hold all of us. We got a new school when I was in ninth grade. But I think that was one of your later questions, right, about high school.

01:50 Yeah, yeah.

01:51 So I'll save that for them.

01:52 We can just talk about it now. Like, what was like your high school experience?

01:56 Like, okay, what I was saying earlier is in ninth grade, we got a brand new high school. It was. We moved in December of that year, which was interesting because they didn't have enough money to hire movers and that. You could never get away with this now, but you could in. In the 90s. I guess this is probably. If I were in ninth grade, that's probably 90, 91. Anyway, they gave no exams that year and asked boys to come bring their trucks to the school. And because the way our. Our middle school was, it, it had the football field or our middle school slash high school, it had the football field behind it. And they built the new school on the other side of it. So all these high school boys, and again this day and age, everybody would have done it. They brought their trucks, got desk, and took them to the new school and they moved the school. And I remember moving myself. We took textbooks. We had, you know, several textbooks Piece or boxes. And we walked across the football field and. And moved into the new school ourself.

03:12 Which they would never let anyone today.

03:15 Oh, no liability now. There's no way they would do that. But it was the early 90s, and they had no money for moving. They had overspent on the building. And so we moved that school, which is kind of neat. I mean, it's a memory I will always have.

03:26 Yeah, not everyone has that, you know.

03:28 No, no. And we were there. We were at that school from 9th through 12th. I think you asked, though, how. What about. About just my high school experience.

03:40 Yeah.

03:41 Yeah.

03:41 Just. Did you like it or. Oh, yeah. What was your favorite thing about it?

03:46 Well, I loved high school. Again, the 90s were a good. Good time to be in. In high school. We. I. Let's see. I did a variety of things. I was SGA president and was editor of my yearbook. And I cheered 9th grade, but broke my arm in half. And so that ended my cheer career. Sorry. And. But we. We were a smaller high school then. Alabama was in six divisions instead of seven. Like, y'all have 7A. The highest was 6A. We were a 5A school. So we're a little bit smaller. You know, everything kind of revolved around the high school in our area, you know, so it was probably just typical of most high school. You know, students went to football games and basketball games.

04:44 And you were pretty involved, I know that.

04:46 Yeah, I was pretty involved. But we only graduated 149, so everybody had to be involved, so that was just what we did.

04:55 Yeah. So what was one of your best memories of, like, your childhood or in high school or just like, kind of growing up? Do you have, like, a favorite memory?

05:04 Hmm. I enjoy travel with my parents. My mom always took these, what she called roaming trips. And then you. You didn't have the Internet or anything, so she would right off to the. Or call the state tourism, I guess, the board or whatever, and get pamphlets from the state and maps from the state, and we would plan these roaming trips where, you know, she would drag us from one Civil War battlefield to another, I'm sure. And so, I mean, we traveled quite a bit growing up, and then we would go to the beach one time a summer, and so we always enjoyed that. But on these roaming trips, we would. We would carry the Coleman stove and we would cook out breakfast at a park or something like that and then eat out, like, had a cooler in the back of the car in the 80s and. And drag out all the picnic stuff and eat and Those are some of my favorite memories of. Of those childhood years. High school memories. Yeah. I also was in charge of the float, and that was some of my most favorite memories are that week of homecoming and getting up in the morning and delivering the float there. And that was a lot of fun.

06:35 That's funny, because we did a practice interview last week to prepare for this one, and I said my favorite memory was building the float in high school.

06:43 That's probably my favorite. What? I don't know. What are my most fond memories?

06:49 Yeah, pass it down to me. No, it's fun. So kind of moving on, like, through your life. What was college like for you?

06:58 I went to Auburn from 95 to 99. I did not. I think I probably knew less than five people when I went.

07:09 Because you grew up in Tuscaloosa.

07:10 Yes. So everyone went to. Everyone either went to Shelton State Community College or the University of Alabama. That's. Those were your places. So all of my friends went there, but I went off kind of on my own. A girl that I knew from another high school, from Tuscaloosa County High, actually. She was SJ president, her school. And we went down to the 94. It was the fall of 94. 4. LSU, Auburn game.

07:44 And were we good then or no?

07:47 Well, in this particular game, Auburn was behind and lsu, I think, through four or five interceptions, I cannot remember. And we came back and won that game, and we just. We loved the. The atmosphere of Auburn. I kind of already knew I was looking at going there. I'd grown up at Auburn, fan, which is very hard. And Tuscaloosa and I, after that game, I looked at my parents and said, I'm coming here. And Lois Ann, my friend Loisann, they had gone to the game with me, said, oh, yeah, we're coming here. And so there weren't many of us that were venturing down to Auburn, but both of us said, hey, we're coming here. We got accepted, we got housing and moved to Auburn in 95. I pledged a sorority, enjoyed it for. In my time there, I majored in social science education. I knew that that's what I wanted to do. And I knew eventually I want to go back and get my master's in admin in administration, and I have done that. But I have been content in the classroom, and I think I'll be content there until at least you and Laney.

09:07 Yeah.

09:08 Graduate and then we'll see.

09:11 So kind of touching on that. How did you know, like, that was what you wanted to do? Like, how did you pick Your major?

09:18 Well, when I started out thinking to go to Auburn, I wanted to go into pharmacy. I'm not sure why I wanted to go in pharmacy because I did not enjoy chemistry, but I went to shadow a pharmacist and did not enjoy it. And then I just. I really, like. I just kept thinking I loved high school. I loved my high school principal. And I was like, I just would like to do that. And so history was kind of my favorite subject. And so I am one of the few that started and finished in the same major. That doesn't happen all the time, but I started and finished in social science education. I graduated there in 99. Gotcha.

10:10 Okay, well, that's cool. I didn't know you started out as a pharmacy or thinking about, like, pharmacy. That's cool. I didn't know that. So how did you, like, prepare for, like, college in a career? Like, what are some things you did? Like, like, economically or, like, with like, grades or. Like, what are things?

10:29 Well, college then was a lot easier to get into than it is now. It just. It just was. You. There weren't a ton of scholarship dollars then, but college was so much less expensive than it is now. So I'm not sure what I did economically. I mean, I got a little bit of scholarship money, but not a ton. And it was. It was just a lot easier to get into than it is these days. Yeah, I think the average act now these days is like 27, 28. I think to get in Auburn then was an 18. Like, it was just a different time than now. So anyway, it wasn't. It wasn't necessarily hard to get into. Like I said, I finished there in 99. And then your question was, how did I get into and then prepare for a career?

11:16 Yeah, how did you prepare for a career?

11:18 And then when I left.

11:19 Do you have any jobs or anything?

11:21 OK. When I left there in 99, I graduated in June of 99. And then I got. I got interviewed in July at Hoover High School and he called back and I'm not sure why in the world. He hired me because I was a baby. But when I started school.

11:43 Weren't you like five years old?

11:44 When I started teaching, I had been 22 for two weeks.

11:47 And you were teaching seniors?

11:49 No, I was teaching freshmen that first year. So I was a little bit. They were 14, but I had been 22 for two weeks. I'm still not sure why Gene Godwin hired me, but he did, and I'm grateful for it. And taught there for seven years.

12:05 That's Cool. I didn't know you taught. I think you did tell me you taught freshman.

12:10 I taught freshman for a year and then at the end of that year I said, I went to my department head and said, I gotta teach something older than this.

12:18 And 14 year old boy boys, they're the downfall.

12:20 So I taught seniors for the rest of the time there. And then when I came to Vestavia, I had to teach freshman for one year too. And then the next year I told all seniors.

12:31 Okay, well, kind of rewinding a bit. Like, what was your favorite thing about college?

12:36 Rewinding like your favorite? Yes, at Auburn. You know, I, I was telling somebody today I loved Auburn for Auburn. I mean I love the team and I love the sports. Right. But I loved Auburn itself. I enjoyed my classes, I enjoyed the sorority. I was very involved at Auburn and enjoyed, you know, tried to try to join it, you know, had a lot of organizations that I was involved in and things like that. And that's part, I think for me, for me personally, getting involved is how I connect with a school.

13:18 What was your favorite thing that you were involved in? Do you know?

13:23 At Auburn, my favorite thing was probably my sorority, but that was probably, I guess that was probably the favorite. Yeah.

13:33 Yeah. Well, kind of shifting gears, I feel like I needed to ask that question. But like when you're going, you said you became a teacher, you love teaching. How has your like job changed after all the years of teaching? Like with all the changes?

13:50 Well, just so you have some dates, I guess I taught at Hoover High School from fall of 99 to January of 06. When you were born. Okay, so about seven years, I went home for four and a half. Then I went back to teaching and I would taught online while I was at home. When you were little. Then I went and taught Spain part for two years and then taught, then left there to teach at Vestavia. And I think this is year 12 at Bathavia. How has teaching changed? I think the biggest change has been technology. We did not. I, when I first started teaching, I taught on an overhead and that projected up on. I mean we didn't even have like I had a computer, but not even a laptop. Like that just wasn't. I mean that's just. It was a desktop. I can't even remember. I think we still put in grades. Everything was in a paper grade book and we calculated by hand. That's been the major change as far as kids, the change. I always say cell phones have changed kind of everything. Because when I first started teaching, I mean, I Think they had cell phones that. Well, I know they had them, but they weren't like, in your pocket. Like, they. I mean, I guess you would have it, but, like, you could just call on it. Like, there was no searching the net for anything. And so just the readily availability of people to be able to just access something. It's just amazing.

15:30 How do you adapt? Like.

15:32 Oh, sure. Well, and you have to adapt. Some of it you've had to adapt and go back to. Things have to be handwritten because people will copy and paste things now or, you know, like, it's. So that is. You're. I feel like now I'm not fighting technology because that's not it. But you. You're having to adapt.

15:52 Yeah. What's it been like teaching government and economics? Kind of ironic that I'm interviewing you from an economics class that you also used to teach. That.

16:01 Yes, I've taught now. My first year of teaching, I taught freshmen. I taught world history. I've taught freshman twice, enjoyed teaching world history. Did not love teaching ninth grade. What I do love about teaching seniors is that there's less management and more teaching, and I like that component. I don't want to manage as far as government and economics. I loved. I loved econ classes. And so that's where I really started off that first year when I taught at Hoover High School teaching seniors. I taught econ, regular econ. I guess I taught that for probably three years. And then the person that taught apart econ, they had some new rules and he had to be highly qualified or something like that. And he wasn't highly qualified in econ, although he's been teaching it for years, but somehow the state certification or something like that. So he came in and said, hey, do you want to teach it? And I studied a lot that year.

17:08 He always says, you always say econ was her first love.

17:11 It is my first love. Econ is my first love. I. I like. I like it the best. But I. And I taught. I guess I taught two or three years before you were born of AP Econ. And then I taught a couple years of it at Vestavia. But right now, this is my. I don't know, since COVID Since the fall of 2020. Right.

17:38 Three years.

17:39 So three years. So this is my third year of teaching just AP gov. I enjoy it as well. I really kind of enjoy that it's a semester class. I enjoy getting to teach new kids after the break. I mean, there's some downfalls to it. I don't get to know kids quite as well as I used to if you taught a whole year. But I don't know, I kind of enjoy getting a whole new bunch of students the second semester. People, you get to know more folks. And then usually by, you know, by the end of a semester when they're tired of you and you're tired of. You know, we just move on. Right. So. But I've enjoyed teaching AP Gov as well, so. And I really enjoy teaching seniors. I enjoy that both of those classes are so practical to me for adulthood. That there's just so many things like real life application you can use.

18:35 It's important for seniors.

18:36 Definitely.

18:37 It's.

18:37 Oh, yeah.

18:37 When they're about to go off.

18:39 Absolutely. Like, I don't. I don't think you could teach that 9th or 10th grade. It's hard enough really for seniors to understand some of the concepts because they're such adult concepts. But you're about to go, embark, be an adult. And I don't know, I think. I feel like most of my job is teaching kids how to be a good citizen now. And we need more of those.

19:04 Yeah, definitely do. So what do you like most about what you do? Do you have a favorite thing about it?

19:11 Yeah, well, it's definitely students first. I enjoy being with young people. I feel like they keep me young. I knew that this is what I wanted to do. I still feel a peace about that this is what God has called me to do and that. Yes. Could I be making more money? I don't know if I've ever told you this. I was offered a pharmaceutical sales job right out of college, making about as much as I. I do right now.

19:45 Out of college?

19:46 Yes.

19:46 Oh, my gosh.

19:49 And I just felt like I needed to give this a try. And even though, you know, there are some things that drive me nuts, but every. I mean, things drive everybody nuts about their. Oh, absolutely nothing. No, no school's perfect. No job is perfect. But when I'm in my room with my students, I know I'm exactly where I'm supposed to be.

20:11 Good. Yeah. I feel like that's important to have, like, a piece about what you do. Like, no matter what it is. Like, if you're. If you don't enjoy it, you shouldn't.

20:19 We spend a lot of hours. You spend a lot of hours at your job, so you better enjoy it.

20:23 Mm. Like I. In the summer, like, working at summer show offs. Like, I put in like 60 hours. Maybe more than 60 hours. 60 hours a week.

20:32 A lot of hours.

20:33 A lot. But, you know, a lot Yes, I do. And it's totally worth it.

20:36 Yeah. So it's not, like, a job.

20:37 Like, I make, like, nothing. But that doesn't matter. It doesn't matter. So I feel like that's important. How has being a parent changed the way that you teach?

20:49 I do feel like parenting changed the way that I teach. I think maybe I'm a little more understanding. I think I gave too much work before you came along. I think, you know, I do give less homework now than I used to, mainly because I think, oh, I want them to go home and enjoy their family. And I know how busy y'all schedules are, so I really. I feel like I don't. I give them more time. Like, I. If I sign something, I say, hey, this is due two weeks from now. Like, you know your schedules better than I know your schedules, mainly because I've seen yours in Laney's schedule and how much time extracurriculars take. And so I try my best not to give a ton.

21:41 Yeah.

21:41 You know.

21:42 Yeah.

21:42 So, I mean, that's. That's. That's going to happen. I mean, you're going to have to study. You have to test in quizzes and things like that. But that's just. But I don't. I don't assign a ton of outside work. Yeah.

21:54 That's good.

21:56 Okay.

21:56 Well, thank you, mom, for letting me ask you these. I think it really helped just understand some things, so thanks.