When asked if there was a teacher who made the biggest impact in his life, Purcell Marian English Teacher Mr. Chris Penkalski smiles and points at Mrs. Marnie Penkalski, his wife.

Both are English teachers at the Castle and have been married for twenty-seven years. When Marnie and Chris talk about their lives, their sentences overlap like a married couple often does.

Teaching in the same school building, sometimes only a couple hundred feet apart, Chris shares, “We are so similar, but also the opposite. I like to say that we’re the opposite sides of the same coin.”

Marnie was born in Rochester, New York, and grew up in Highland Heights, Northern Kentucky, just right across the river. She earned her bachelor’s degree from Eastern Kentucky University and her master’s from Northern Kentucky University, but she didn’t find herself in the classroom immediately. She spent years in business, managing logistics and schedules for a major shipping company. She stepped into the classroom for the first time at age 35.

“By the middle of that first year,” she remembers, “I knew. Why have I been doing anything else with my life? This is where I belong.”

Chris came from Buffalo, New York, but moved to Las Vegas when he was 8. He would stay there for 45 years. After decades working in carpentry, it was Marnie who encouraged him to make a change.

“His interaction with kids coaching football, and his influence on them, and how they responded to him,” Marnie shared, “He was a natural.” After subbing in classrooms, Chris followed Marnie’s advice and made the leap, discovering his calling was also in the classroom.

“My rapport with the kids, that’s where my strength is. And, if I can get them to write me a good sentence and then a good paragraph and then a good essay, that’s the foundation.”

At Purcell Marian, their classrooms reflect their personalities. Marnie describes hers as measured and precise: “Everything is very intentional. The character building posters are perfectly spaced.” It’s a part of her approach with students — to teach them how to be organized for life, use a binder, and write in a planner.

Chris, by contrast, embraces what he calls “intentionally random.” His classroom has posters of inspirational sayings, mixed in with a Michael Jordan poster.

Students notice the difference.

“They don’t like her at first, but then they grow to love her,” Chris teases. Marnie smiles at often being known as “the meanest teacher,” only to receive grateful notes from students at graduation, and sometimes, years later. She pushes her students to grow, to learn, and to challenge themselves, and while they may not appreciate it immediately, by graduation, most realize that her push is her caring deeply about their success.

The Penkalskis attend soccer games and football games, and any event where they can support students after the school day ends. They refer to their students as “our kids.”

Chris says simply, “When we go home and we want to talk, we know what each other are talking about.”

Marnie adds, “This is a tough job, and so to have someone who truly understands that...” She trails off and smiles at Chris.

While the couple shares their day-to-day lives at Purcell Marian, both teaching English, and with classrooms only a few feet apart, they guard their own identities in the school.

“That’s Coach, and I’m Mrs. P!” Marnie insists, but their shared purpose is clear: modeling for students healthy relationships and lifelong learning.