Dr. Margaret J. Godbey, Associate Professor of English, is the South Carolina Independent Colleges and Universities' (SCICU) 2024 Excellence in Teaching Award recipient for Coker University. Dr. Godbey holds a Master of Arts in English from DePaul University, Chicago, IL, and a Ph.D. in English from Temple University, Philadelphia, PA. Since joining Coker, her research areas expanded from nineteenth-century British literature and illustration, and composition and rhetoric, to include children’s and young adult literature, mythology, and folklore. Her work has been published in Victorian Periodicals Review, Teacher Education Journal of South Carolina, and the ALAN Review. 

Dr. Godbey’s pedagogy in composition is consistently student-centered. Her literature courses are inclusive and diverse, addressing current topics and including experiences that extend beyond the classroom. Dr. Godbey was instrumental in redesigning Coker University’s in-seat and online first-year writing program, aligning it with the Outcomes Statement of the Council of Writing Program Administrators (CWPA). Recently, she became the director of the student-run Writer’s Studio and supports and mentors the student tutors in their work. 

An avid traveler, Dr. Godbey has led multiple study away and study abroad programs. As Director of Educational Travel and Fulbright Program Advisor, she assists Coker University students pursuing short-term and semester-long programs and applying for national scholarships. In addition, she has been a reader for the Gilman Scholarship Program for study abroad. Dr. Godbey's work as an educator includes mentoring students and faculty, both officially and unofficially, and her excellent teaching can be seen both in and out of the classroom.