Donovan Davis
Posted on 02/11/2021
Donovan Davis

Today’s #HCSHeroes Spotlight is Donovan Davis, a school counselor at Middle Valley Elementary School. Mr. Davis was nominated for his calm presence and fun personality which encourages students.


Every morning, Mr. D is out at the car rider line, playing his guitar or ukulele to make sure the kids get a calm start to their morning,” said Jamie Barbeauld, a parent. “We just love Mr. D and all that he does for the well-being of our students. With all the changes going on, his calm presence in the morning makes a huge difference for the students.”


With all of the changes that Covid-19 has brought to the school year, Mr. Davis and his colleague, Maddie Cartwright, have been creative and flexible with their schools counseling program. “We have created a Canvas Course called Counselors' Corner to provide additional Social Emotional Learning options by going through the book "The 7 Habits of Happy Kids." We created an online newsletter that we update weekly to share all about our counseling program, resources, and what we have been up to recently,” said Mr. Davis. “And while we have been fully virtual, we have created a "Live Zoom" time to meet with students and parents daily during their lunch time (11am-1pm) to help any way we can.”


Mr. Davis has worked hard to sort out schedules in order to continue lessons online and keep students excited and engaged. “We are continuing classroom lessons virtually to highlight a character trait of the month. After we teach these lessons, we hold a Character Award Assembly at the end of the month to celebrate one student per class who was chosen as a student who models that character trait. Normally we have a huge assembly in the gym where we invite the parents and family of the winners to join in with the whole school to celebrate,” said Mr. Davis. “One of the highlights of working as a school counselor is to celebrate Positive Character, and we didn't want this celebration to be halted because of Covid. So, we have gone fully virtual and celebrate on Zoom with each grade level and the winner's family. Each winner receives a lanyard that we create with their name and the Character Trait that they have modeled. It's awesome to be a part of teaching and celebrating the whole child!”

At Middle Valley Elementary the school counseling program mission statement is, "Discovering our "Awesome" together." Mr. Davis says, “That's my favorite part of my job, is helping students discover their own and others' value!”

The efforts of our teachers and staff are truly heroic, and we are proud to have people like Mr. Davis on our team to support our students!


Nominate an #HCSHero: http://bit.ly/HCSHeroes