A Center Grove elementary school principal remembers the day earlier in his career when a child was scared of a violent storm.
Davin Harpe was working in another school district at the time, and the weather had turned treacherous. One third-grader told Harpe that he was scared of storms. Harpe turned the weather into a lesson, telling the child facts about storms and how storms worked.
A decade later, Harpe, now the principal at Sugar Grove Elementary School in the Center Grove school district, received a call from the student who told him that whenever it storms, he thinks of his former educator.
“It is things like that that is neat about what we do,” Harpe said.
Harpe has received a statewide award and is being credited with changing his school by improving communication among and with teachers and collaborative teaching methods.
For the past four years, Harpe has helped transformed Sugar Grove Elementary School’s teaching methods, concentrating on teaching workshops and individual student achievement. The school has earned two “A” grades from the Indiana Department of Education and been named a four-star school under his leadership. This year, he was named the Indiana Association of School Principals 2016 Elementary Principal of the Year.
He was nominated by a colleague to be the District 9 elementary school principal of the year. District 9 includes all of Johnson, Brown and Bartholomew counties and parts of Morgan and Monroe counties. The 12 district winners then were reviewed by a panel of judges who name the statewide winner. That panel chose Harpe as principal of the year.
Local principals and assistant principals have been named District 9 winners dozens of times. Six have snagged the top honor since the award’s 1992 inception. Harpe will be honored at an education conference in Washington, D.C., next fall.
The award process starts with a nomination from a colleague, which is one of the greatest aspects of the award, said Todd Bess, executive director of the Indiana Association of School Principals.
“The biggest honor is that someone nominated him in the first place,” Bess said.
Harpe has nearly transformed Sugar Grove Elementary School in the four years he has been principal, assistant principal Marianne Dooms said.
She nominated him because of what he has done for the school. He has large ideas that he is able to break into the smaller steps so teachers and students can more easily complete what he his asking of them. And his communication with teachers and students is impeccable, she said.
“He has an excellent vision for student achievement and building teaching capacity,” Dooms said.
One of his initiatives is to cater to each student in the way they learn.
He created literacy workshops where students are placed into small groups based on the way they learn. Their teacher can then cater lessons and how information is presented more individually during those workshops, Harpe said.
Students get more individualized lesson plans and teachers can then share exactly how each of their students learn with other teachers to get feedback and ideas on what they can do next. Math workshops are being implemented next, he said.
“We really want to think about the kids’ experience,” he said.
When he talks to teachers, he tells them to visualize each of their student’s faces when they make a teaching decision, Dooms said.
“It has promoted student achievements and has built trust among staff members,” she said.
Harpe decided when he was a high school student that he wanted a career in education.
He was a lifeguard at his school’s pool in Tell City and started teaching swim lessons. Teaching kids how to stay safe in the pool and how to swim was what made him want to make a career out of teaching, he said.
“I just really got excited and felt good teaching kids how to swim,” he said.
He earned his bachelor’s degree from Indiana University and masters and doctorate degrees from Ball State University and Purdue University.
He has taught almost every elementary school grade as a teacher, except kindergarten and fifth grade, at school districts all across central Indiana.
At one school district, he was the acting principal for a while, and the rapport he had with students and teachers made him want to make the move to administration full time. And he liked that other teachers were asking him for advice. Administration positions would allow him to help more students and teachers.
“I felt good about that and thought I was making a bigger difference,” he said.
Four years ago he left a principal job in Brownsburg Schools to move to Sugar Grove. His family lived in Greenwood and it would be less of a commute.
Now he drives two of his three children to Sugar Grove daily. And he treasures the little moments that make being an educator worthwhile.
“I will always remember kids and how sweet and caring they are,” he said.
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Here is a look at local past Indiana Association School Principals of the year and District 9 winners.
Statewide winners:
1993: James Halik, Center Grove Middle School
1999: Pamela Millikan, Custer Baker Intermediate School
2002: Anne Young, Clark Elementary School
2009: Matt Shockley, Center Grove High School
2011: Tim Rinehold, Clark-Pleasant Middle School
2016: Davin Harpe, Sugar Grove Elementary School
District 9 winners:
1993: George Frampton, Center Grove High School, assistant principal
1994: Betty Sisco, Center Grove High School, assistant principal
1995: Walter Vanderbush, Franklin Community High School
1996: Robert Hynds, Greenwood Community High School, assistant principal
1997: Robert Baker, Northwood Elementary School
1999: Mel Ficklin, Greenwood Community High School, assistant principal
2001:Roger Micnerski,Pleasant Grove Elementary
2003: Rodney King, Indian Creek Middle School
2004: Connie Richhart, Indian Creek Middle School, assistant principal
2005: Andy Cline, Indian Creek High School, assistant principal; Leighton Turner, Franklin Community High School; Linda Bayne, Sugar Grove Elementary School
2006: Sondra Wooton, Clark-Pleasant Middle School.
2007: Thomas Galovic IV, Whiteland Community High School; Vanessa Noblitt,Greenwood Community Middle School; Cheryl Christen, Maple Grove Elementary
2008: Rebecca Courtney-Knight, Whiteland Elementary School; John Schilawski, Whiteland Community High School, assistant principal
2009: Brad Arbuckle, Clark-Pleasant Middle School, assistant principal; Jack Parker, Center Grove Middle School Central
2010: Sandra Hillman, Center Grove High School, assistant principal, Shelley Gies, Clark Elementary School
2011: Deb Brown-Nally, Northwood Elementary School
2012: Andy Cline, Indian Creek High School, assistant principal; Terry Magnuson, Pleasant Crossing Elementary School
2013: Dave Ennis, Indian Creek Intermediate School; Todd Garrison, Greenwood Community High School, assistant principal; Jack Parker, Center Grove Middle School Central; John Schilawski, Whiteland Community High School
2014: Sean Zachery, Indian Creek Middle School, assistant principal; Maria Woodke, Indian Creek High School
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