The Governor’s Award for Volunteer Service honors the history and tradition of volunteerism and community service in North Carolina. For 33 years, the award program has honored the true spirit of volunteerism in North Carolina by recognizing individuals, families, groups and businesses that make a significant contribution to their community through volunteer service.

Karen Peck, a past Young Life community chairwoman, nominated Howdy and Tanner for the awards.

“I truly cannot think of two women that I admire more than Julie Howdy and Sheila Tanner,” Peck said. “They oversee a ministry to teen moms in Beaufort County.”

Peck said because of cooperation provided by the Beaufort County Schools’ adolescent parenting program, Howdy and Tanner are able to minister to teen moms who are scared, overwhelmed, alone and feel defeated.

Through various settings, Peck said, the two women develop relationships with the teen moms, with the women serving as models of consistency and caring for teen moms whose lives are marked by chaos and confusion.

“They epitomize caring and commitment,” Peck said. “They not only oversaw and brought to fruition YoungLives in Beaufort County, but the impact of their service on the community has been critical. They give unselfishly of their time and resources.”

Howdy and Tanner had no idea they had been nominated for the award.

“I literally had no idea Karen was even doing anything like this for us,” Howdy said. “I didn’t even know why she wanted us to stand up there at first.”

Howdy and Tanner began the YoungLives Outreach to Teen Moms in September 2009. They established a committee to oversee Young Lives, which recruited, trained and paired mentors with teen moms. The program provides a monthly lunch meeting at Southside and Washington high schools, sponsors a monthly dinner and runs a club with a nursery provided.

“Their caring presence in these young moms’ lives gives these young women hope,” she said, “hope that they can finish school, hope that they can be good moms, hope that they can forgive themselves for poor decisions that they have made. These ladies are changing lives and richly deserve to be recognized for their unselfish and incalculable service that they give.”

“We’ve been doing this for about five years now,” Tanner said. “We learned that the teenage pregnancies began to increase in Beaufort County. To see these young moms grow up and become more than they thought they could be is so worth it. To see them smile and know that life has not passed them by just because they had a child early is worth it.”

“Every girl here has their own story,” Tanner said. “To hear their story and hear what’s going on in their lives is wonderful. The impact we have on these girls, we hope, will trickle down to their children and the next generation. That’s what it’s all about.”

Howdy said many of the young mothers feel isolated and alone after having a baby, some of which are shunned by their families.

“And we don’t want that for them,” she said. “We want them to have the support and love to feel good about themselves. We want them to finish school and go on to college. Some of them have finished their two-year degrees and are in four-year universities now.”

Gov. Beverly Perdue wrote Howdy and Tanner a letter congratulating them on their awards and accomplishments in volunteer service and thanking them for making their community a better place.