TIFTON — Galia Savage has been chosen as this year’s Excellence in Parenting Award recipient by community members who nominated her for the award. PLIGHT, Inc. will be hosting their annual Scholarship & Excellence in Parenting Award banquet to honor Savage and scholarship recipients at 7 p.m., Dec. 16, at the Abraham Baldwin Agricultural College Dining Hall.

Dr. Tamisha Blackshear, chairman of the parenting committee, said there are tickets available for $20 and they can be purchased from any PLIGHT member or at the office at the community center on South Central Avenue. For more information, contact Blackshear or Executive Director Olga White at 386-4360.

White advised that the ticket money includes the meal at the banquet and every year it goes toward scholarships for high school graduates. She said they have three honorees this year.

White said some of the nominations submitted about Savage read that she is a “praying mom,” “very involved with her kids’ extra-curricular activities,” “works full-time,” “keeps her kids in church,” “very family-oriented,” “very professional at her job at Plantel” and “has a great sense of humor.”

Savage works as a customer service representative for Plant Telecommunications, owned by Danny and Beverly Sterling. She said she has worked for the company since the city took it over and has enjoyed working there.

Savage said Tuesday that it’s an honor to be recognized for the Excellence in Parenting Award.

“I really didn’t realize the extent of this award,” Savage said.

She said that her best friend Melody Nunley and April Turner of Tifton Estates nominated her for the award. Savage said she found out that she was this year’s winner from a voicemail message at work and from phone calls and text messages informing her to check the social media website Facebook.

Savage has two children — Bricin Savage, 7, and Jessica Savage, 14. Both children are very active in sports. Bricin is a student at Annie Belle Clark Primary School. He plays baseball and football at the Recreation Department, made the All-Star team and participated in the Turkey Bowl. Jessica is a ninth grader at Tift County High School Northeast Campus. She plays on the ninth-grade basketball team, junior varsity team and the high school varsity team when she’s needed.

Bricin and Jessica are very proud of their mother's being recognized as an excellent parent, because that’s exactly who she is to them.

“She deserves it,” Jessica said Tuesday.

Besides being a full-time mother, Savage is also a full-time student. She said she has been taking online classes at Ashford University since 2008. She said she stays planted at the computer doing school work and won’t leave until her work is complete. Savage has held a 3.8 grade point average throughout college and has been recognized on the dean’s list. She’s currently working to get a bachelor's degree in education.

“By the work of the Lord, I have been able to do it,” Savage said. “My schooling is non-stop. Every five weeks, I start a new course.”

Savage said she went through many obstacles to go back to school. She said she will not put her schooling on hold if she can help it.

“In 1986, I attended college for one year. I have a great family, but they couldn’t afford it. It was hard for my mom and it was rough for me to find a job to help without having any way to get around in a car,” Savage said. “I’ve been through a lot of ups and downs — some wonderful and some not so much. The good Lord has helped me.”

Savage said she’s a very sad person when she’s not around her children and they make her proud. She said she has always done it alone financially, with only one income coming in.

“We may not have all the riches in the world, but this is a happy family,” Savage said. “You have to invest in your children. You don’t have to buy them all this material stuff to make them happy. Put in the quality time and it will pay off.”

Savage said she’s honest with her children and sets boundaries so that they realize the importance of being a polite and respectful individual others can appreciate, because not all children are being raised in such a way.

“You have to be a parent, not their friend,” Savage said. “If you get your kids right at home, they’ll carry that along with them at school and elsewhere.”

Savage said she tries to raise her children the right way and prefers to be honest with them. She said that her family isn’t perfect and that peer pressure can be very intimidating for children to pick up in school from those who tend to act out.

“I would tell any parent that you know when you’re doing right by your children, but it’s the parents’ children that are not being brought up in the right way that are influencing the ones that are doing right. They’re making it hard, causing parents to start all over teaching their child right again because they’re picking it up. Peer pressure is very strong.”

Savage said she has substituted on and off for some years and she’s seen what teachers have to deal with each day.

“I changed some children's lives and some I could not,” Savage said. “Time has changed. Educators and administrators need help from home. If parents put in as much time with their children as they do shopping for their Christmas gifts, it would be amazing in the difference it would make.”

Savage said that her sister Elevia Bateman and her brother Harold Rollend Milliken Jr. are her inspirations and that she’s the person she is today because of her grandparents John W. Savage Sr. and Tommie Lee Savage and her mother, Mattie T. Savage.

“They are the very core to my everything besides God,” Savage said. “They are the reason for it all.”



To contact reporter Latasha Everson, call 382-4321.