Henderson, NV - Joyce L. Woodhouse

1944 - 2026

Joyce Laraine Woodhouse, beloved educator, three-term State Senator, and tireless advocate for the children, families, and schools of Nevada, passed away on Saturday, May 9, 2026, at the age of 82. She leaves behind a legacy measured by the generations of Nevadans whose lives she touched, one classroom and one piece of legislation at a time.

Joyce was born in 1944 in Glendive, Montana. The eldest of five daughters, she was raised on a Hereford cattle ranch, first in Wibaux, Montana, and later in Big Timber where she learned the values that would guide the rest of her life: hard work, neighborliness, faith, and the conviction that every person matters. She graduated from Sweet Grass County High School in Big Timber, Montana and earned her bachelor's degree in Elementary Education from Carroll College in Helena, Montana. Soon after, she answered the call of a teaching job that would bring her to the rapidly growing Las Vegas Valley - the community she would call home for the rest of her life.

Joyce devoted forty years to the Clark County School District. She spent seventeen of those years as a first-grade teacher, helping countless young Nevadans take their first steps as readers and learners. She went on to serve as principal of Ullom Elementary School and later as a district program administrator, mentoring teachers and shaping programs that reached far beyond any single classroom.

Even as her career advanced, she continued her own studies earning two master's degrees from the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, one in Curriculum and Instruction and another in Educational Leadership. A proud "Double Rebel,"

she would later be inducted into the inaugural class of the UNLV College of Education Hall of Fame in 2024.

Joyce retired from the school district in 2006 and, with the steadfast support of her husband, Al Wittenberg, launched a campaign for the Nevada State Senate that same year. She represented District 5 from 2006 to 2010, and District 6 from 2012 to 2020, returning to Carson City for six regular sessions and 10 special sessions in all. In the Legislature, she chaired the Senate Committee on Education, the Senate Committee on Legislative Operations and Elections, and in her final years in office, the powerful Senate Committee on Finance. Colleagues from both sides of the aisle came to know her as a quietly relentless force: warm and gracious in the hallway, prepared and persistent in the hearing room. Over the course of her legislative career, she championed bipartisan reforms to expand education funding, strengthen public health care, create job opportunities, and direct help to the communities that needed it most. After leaving the Senate, she continued to advise the Nevada Senate Democrats and served as a member of the Commission on School Funding and the Commission on Innovation and Excellence in Education, helping to shape the next chapter of Nevada's education system.

Joyce's contributions earned recognition across her professions. She was named "Outstanding Champion" by the Metro Chamber, received the "Leadership in Education" award from Phi Delta Kappa, was honored as "Distinguished Woman of the Year" by the Soroptimists of Nevada, and was celebrated as an "Unsung Hero" by the Nevada Public Education Association. In 2025 she was inducted into the Nevada Senate Hall of Fame, and in 2026, into the Clark County School District Excellence in Education Hall of Fame.

Friends remember Joyce as unfailingly kind, instinctively curious about other people, and quick to laugh. She was a person of deep faith, a parishioner of St. Thomas More Catholic Community in Henderson, a lover of the arts and especially of the Smith Center for the Performing Arts, and a proud supporter of UNLV.

Joyce was preceded in death by her parents Evelyn and Roland Woodhouse, husband, Al Wittenberg in 2013, her sister Frances Guthridge in 2012, and nephew Jonathan (JJ) Leuwer in 2008.

She is survived by her three sisters, Cheryl Duncan (Lloyd), Berdine Woodhouse, and Claudia Howard (Gerry), seven nieces and nephews, Aiden Guthridge (Kalin), Kiele Guthridge, Jeff Duncan (Annmarie), Amy Parson (Mike), Mikale Leuwer, Kyle Howard, and Shane Howard, and a host of lifelong friends.

A Celebration of the Life of Senator Joyce Woodhouse will be held on Monday, June 1, 2026.

Mass of Christian Burial — 1:00 p.m.

St. Thomas More Catholic Community, 130 N. Pecos Road, Henderson, Nevada

Celebration of Life Reception — immediately following

Legacy Golf Club, 130 Par Excellence Drive, Henderson, Nevada

To honor her, the Senator encouraged support for the organizations she valued most: Communities in Schools of Nevada, Nevada Center for Civic Engagement, St. Thomas More Catholic Community and The Smith Center for Performing Arts.