Westinghouse High School coach and teacher Phyllis Jones was honored with a proclamation by Pittsburgh Mayor Ed Gainey Wednesday. Family, fellow teachers, former students and players came together to celebrate Jones for what they called her positive impact on the community of Wilkinsburg.
Jones has been with the Westinghouse High School for 35 years where she served as the high school health teacher and basketball coach for the Lady Bulldogs. Through her role in the high school, speakers at the ceremony said Jones has influenced hundreds of students not only to play basketball, but also to continue to pursue their education.
“Her goal was to uplift the students and to make sure that they had a better life from where they came from. And so she gave them hope and she sacrificed herself in order to do that,” said Jones’ older sister, Sarah Jones. “I watched her work overtime. I watched her give [others her] time, money and her talents.”
Jones became the head coach of the Lady Bulldogs in 1990 and shaped the program into a force: She has more than 400 wins under her belt, and her teams have never had a losing season. For the first 24 seasons Jones coached the Bulldogs, the team made it to the City League championship game. Her husband, Dennis Floyd Jones, said his wife instilled a culture that went beyond winning in Westinghouse.
“She worked with kids in the summer. She had them volunteer in the community programs, at churches, at some of their senior citizen homes, picking up trash. They always had to do something to give back. She taught them that what they were doing was bigger than them,” he said. “It was not about just winning. It was about contributing to the community, making themselves understand that we are better if we help others.”
Many of Phyllis Jones’ former players have gone on to become coaches in their own communities and become leaders in other ways.
“They [former students] found ways within their own sort of scope of influence, ways to be kind of influential,” said Denise Jones, the coach’s daughter. “And so they have a spirit of giving back or paying it forward, and then they also make an impact within their lives as well.”
Denise herself is continuing her mother’s legacy and studying community-based youth development programs as a Ph.D. student at the University of Michigan.
