Antonio Pennix hardly had any extra hours to spare.

The 34-year-old works weekdays at the University of Maryland, Baltimore, as a manager and weekends as a security officer. He’s dedicated to providing a steady income and being a strong role model for his four kids living in Edmondson Village.

But Pennix wanted more.

“Going back to school was a personal thing that I always wanted to do, but now that I got it and I did it, it’s going to benefit them tremendously,” Pennix said.

On Friday, after 15 years away from the classroom, he achieved his goal, joining more than 50 graduates from the Excel Center, a free adult high school for Maryland students.

Pennix celebrated with the other graduates, snapping photos and navigating bundles of congratulatory, sparkly balloons as he reminisced.

“I doubted myself my whole life, but I did it,” said Pennix, wearing a dark green, creased gown with Excel Center pins on his bright white collar.

The road to getting a diploma was long and had to fit into Pennix’s already busy daily routine.

In the mornings, Pennix would get his daughters ready for school, assembling his youngest daughter’s pink backpack before heading out the door to grab hoagie sandwiches from 7-Eleven for their lunches.

Pennix then received kisses on the cheek and watched 10-year-old Amia and 4-year-old Avah lock hands before crossing the street to school. Then it was on to check on his mother, Cynthia Green, who recently had surgery.

Pennix, the youngest of his siblings, checked to see if his mom had eaten and taken her medicine. They laughed about how much he loved TV’s Barney and hamsters when he was growing up. And through the postoperative pain, Green praised her son’s accomplishments, recalling how she always told him it was “never too late” to go back and get his diploma.

After leaving his mother’s house, he was usually off to the Excel Center for several hours of classes before picking up his daughters, taking them home and heading to work. On weekends, Pennix works two 12-hour shifts as a security officer.

Luckily, through a partnership between the University of Maryland, Baltimore, and the Excel Center, the school accommodated his responsibilities at work and home.

Operated by Goodwill Industries of the Chesapeake Inc., the Excel Center, on Redwood Street in downtown Baltimore, was created in 2023 and provides eight-week sessions throughout the year. The center also includes other services, including certification in nursing and CPR, on-site child care, and access to a washer and dryer for unhoused students.

An estimated 81,000 adults in Baltimore do not have a high school diploma, according to the Abell Foundation. The state of Maryland authorized its first adult high school, South Baltimore Adult High School, in 2018. Since its inception, the Excel Center, has only had one other graduating class aside from Pennix’s.

“We try to remove as many barriers as we can to keep the students coming and confident,” said Sherry DeFrancisci, the center’s director.

On a recent school day, several current and former teachers greeted Pennix as he walked through the brightly lit halls of the center. Pennix’s confidence in his ability to improve and excel, they said, helped push him through his latest transformation.

His life coach, Ashley Gaines-Seay, remembered how nervous and hesitant to open up Pennix was at their first meeting years ago. Even then, she said, he seemed to have all the ingredients for success — work ethic, goals and dreams — as he pursued his once-elusive high school diploma.

Learning was a struggle for a young Pennix as a traditional student, and he remembers how he was often the butt of jokes.

“I always wanted to do school, but it was like, the harder I tried, the more difficult it got,” he said.

Midway through middle school, he hardly participated, but he was still getting promoted to the next grade level. By the time he was a freshman at Carver Vocational-Technical High School in West Baltimore, he stopped going to school entirely after a childhood friend was shot and killed in front of him.

“To numb myself from what I was going through in my personal life, I just worked all day,” Pennix said.

From roughly 17 to 24, he held two full-time jobs. He also leaned into his love of dogs, training with his 4-year-old Belgian Malinois named Roxie, who eventually became his K-9 security dog.

After he decided two years ago to go back to school, he faced many hurdles, most notably Algebra 2. The class was enough to make Pennix want to quit, and he walked out of the classroom of his favorite teacher, David Smith.

“I saw that he could do it,” Smith said. “I just needed him to see.”

With his diploma in hand, Pennix said he can see himself becoming a police officer because he enjoys helping people. In the near term, however, he plans to stay with the university job after a recent promotion.

Despite the long wait and the hectic schedule he endured to make it happen, Pennix said it was all worth it.

“I think I put the hard work in already by getting school out the way,” Pennix said. “I think it’s going to start easing up from here on out.”