BROWARD COUNTY, Fla. – On this week’s Mom to Mom, Local 10’s Nicole Perez sat down with a young woman who received support and guidance from a South Florida organization meant to help empower girls and prepare them for the work force.
Savannah Powers has big dreams of becoming an esthetician one day and own her own business. She said the goal is to help others, knowing it is exactly what she needed just a few years ago.
“I kind of wanted to share a light, because I was in a really dark place and able to make my way out of it with the help of PACE,” said Savannah Powers.
Pace Center for Girls in Broward County is an organization that provides counseling, therapy and education for girls ages 12 to 17.
It is located in Wilton Manors, Florida, is part of a statewide network of 21 centers dedicated to transforming the lives of girls through education, counseling, and life skills development.
Chief program officer for the organization, Angie Pappas says the focus at PACE is for the girls to complete middle to high school.
“We’ll have girls who are just failing out of school and just not feeling like they belong. They may have experience bullying. They may have experience trouble at home. We also have girls who have begun to get involved in behaviors that have caused them to run away. They’ve been involved with the juvenile justice system,” said Pappas.
Every course and standardized test the girls take within the program is part of the Broward County Public School district curriculum. Upon graduation, the girls will receive their high school diploma.
“So really if you’re a girl who’s struggling in school, you feel like no one’s listening to you, you feel like you have no voice, you feel like things are just not going the way you want them to be, and you’re struggling you can call us and we will figure out how to help,” said Pappas.
That was the case for Savannah Powers.
“My first week here was kind of an adjustment. But, once I like kind of got my way around and stuff things went for the most part smoothly, I would say hands down the staff is everything that like kept me through it,” said Savannah Powers.
Savannah, her mother, Shannon Powers, and Nicole sat down to have a conversation about her time with the organization and why their family chose to make the switch from attending her high school, to transferring to the Pace Center for Girls Broward.
“You have more individual care rather than like back in public school everyone’s just teaching everyone the same thing. There’s no really getting to know each person individually,” said Savannah Powers.
Since its founding in 1992, Pace Broward has served girls across the county, offering academic programs aligned with the local school district to help them stay on track and recover credits if needed.
It would be too difficult for Savannah to open up to Nicole when they sat down earlier this month, so her mother stepped in.
“She had a rough freshman year with some domestic violence. We had to get the police involved. The self-medicating started, the not doing well in school started and the roller coaster just was going down rapidly, and we were at our wits end,” said Shannon Powers.
Shannon said she and her husband did whatever they could to help their daughter get out of the dark place she was in. That’s when they found the Pace Center for Girls.
During her time at Pace, Savannah successfully completed all of her junior and senior year requirements, ultimately graduation early. She as chosen as the student speaker at her graduation and their annual luncheon.
Savannah tells Nicole she is now in a healthy relationship. The organization is free to students and families, but they do rely on donations from the public.
The Pace Center for Girls Broward is launching the Healthy Girls Challenge to help girls in the South Florida community.
The first 50 Pace Center donors who contribute $1,000 or more through June 30, 2025, will receive a $100 reward certificate at Heavenly Spa by Westin at The Westin Fort Lauderdale Beach Resort. The goal is to reach $50,000 in donations.
Donations can be made online by clicking on this link.
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