Victoria Pennington, LMSW, CCLS, CPST

Vikki has been a child life specialist for over twenty years, obtaining her Bachelor’s degree in Human Environmental Science with an emphasis in child development at the University of Arkansas. She received her Masters of Social Work from the University of Houston. Her career as a child life specialist started at Arkansas Children’s Hospital (ACH), where she completed her internship. With her internship completed, she obtained employment with Texas Children’s Hospital in the Emergency Center for almost four years. An opportunity arose to work for Shriner’s Hospitals for Children for Orthopedics, Rehab/Subacute, and Cleft Lip & Palate, where she stayed for eleven and half years. For the last 8 years, she has worked at Children’s Memorial Hermann in the Neonatal ICU IV and recently moved into the Pediatric Inpatient Rehabilitation unit at TIRR Memorial Hermann. Vikki has also been a Child Passenger Safety Technician for about 20 years. She has always had an interest in making sure children were safer leaving than they came into the hospital. Along the way, Vikki has grown a passion for helping others with grief, bereavement, and trauma and has been able to do that through the Code Lilac peer-to-peer psychological first aid program. Being a founding member of Code Lilac in 2015, Vikki continues to lead this program system wide. Vikki’s dedication and commitment to supporting children, families, and peers has shown through her achievements over the years.