DOVER — Dover Elementary School Principal Josh Daniels said he had a lot of good teachers when he was growing up in Jasper, and his mother was a cook and custodian in the school for a time.
He started as a second-grade teacher, became an assistant elementary principal and principal, and he has now been named superintendent of the 1,350-student Dover School District.
“I enjoy being around the kids here, but I see it as having a bigger impact,” Daniels said of his new position. “I’ve grown to love this community. We’ve got a lot of great things going on here; I wanted that opportunity to push things forward.”
Superintendent Jerry Owens, 56, will retire June 30, “but I’m keeping my options open,” he said.
The Dover School Board unanimously voted at its Nov. 17 meeting to hire Daniels. His salary will be “a little over” $100,000, he said.
Owens said Daniels is the right choice because “first of all, he’s just an outstanding young man and has a great personality. He deals with people very well, and that’s so important in this position, and it comes naturally to him. His teachers love him; parents love him; kids love him.”
Owens also said Daniels has a “proven track record” in curriculum.
“He’s way better than me at curriculum. I think he can take us to the next level in curriculum, and that’s what you want, and that’s what I want,” Owens said.
Being able to meet with Owens and pick his brain for a few months “reassures me,” Daniels said.
Daniels went to Arkansas Tech University in Russellville after high school and majored in elementary education.
“I saw it as an opportunity to impact the future, a way to give back,” he said. “I’ve always been around kids; it’s a way to keep me young.”
At 34 years old, that’s not too hard.
His first job was teaching second grade in the Pottsville School District.
“I’ve always loved the little ones, … watching them learn and grow,” he said. Daniels earned a master’s degree in teaching, leadership and learning and taught second grade for six years in Pottsville before being hired as assistant elementary school principal in Dover.
“I enjoyed it, had a great time. I always joked, if I didn’t like the principal thing, I’d go back into the classroom,” he said.
But Daniels did like “the principal thing.” He was the assistant principal for three years at Dover Elementary School under Donny Forehand.
When Forehand became middle school principal four years ago, Daniels was promoted to elementary principal. The school has 503 students this year.
Daniels said he will make a recommendation to the board for a replacement for himself, and he is looking at in-house applicants now.
“If we need to, we can open it up outside,” he said. “Hopefully, I’ll have a decision in a month or so on that.”
Daniels said there were several reasons that he wanted to be superintendent.
“It’s kind of like the classroom thing. I enjoy being around the kids here, but I see [the superintendent job] as having a bigger impact.”
District patrons approved a 3.2-mill property-tax increase in 2015, the third attempt in less than two years, to fund an estimated $10.65 million project.
A new middle school complex opened in August, ahead of schedule, Daniels said.
“It’s beautiful,” Daniels said. “Our core facilities are super nice right now. The elementary [school] is only eight years old. … The high school is 20, 25 years old.
“We have a great system, and I want everybody to know that — that’s probably one of my big goals, is to get that positive message out to everyone in the River Valley.
“The big things I want to achieve — I want to make sure we’re preparing our kids for life after high school, college and careers,” he said. “There are a lot of jobs out there that we need to get our kids ready for, and I think we can help with that.”
He said some of the Dover seniors are working with Arkansas Tech to take classes, and students are also taking classes at the University of Arkansas Community College at Morrilton to earn associate degrees by the time they graduate from high school.
“The world we live in, there are a lot of opportunities online with concurrent credit,” Daniels said, but Dover also offers that “small-town touch.”
“Climate and culture are important to me. We offer a lot of extracurricular activities, and we’re doing a lot of neat things with kids and looking at kids individually,” he said, adding that is the hallmark of a small-school setting. “[The students] are all different, and we’re going to take what they need and get them ready for that next step, whether it is college or careers.”
Daniels said Dover students compete well on state-mandated tests.
“Early on, we’re well above many of our peers,” he said. The elementary and middle schools have received money through the Recognition and Reward Program for meeting certain goals. He said some of the money was used to purchase Chromebooks for students.
“We’re well above in several areas in the high school,” he said. Although with the transition to ACT Aspire testing last year, the scores dipped slightly, Daniels said test scores districtwide are still above the state average.
“I want everybody to hear that name Dover and know all the positive things we’re doing with kids,” he said.
His wife, Amber, teaches second grade at Pottsville Elementary School. They have three children — Ashley, 17, a senior at Pottsville High School; Grady, 7; and Tynley, 4, who will attend the Dover School District in the fall, he said.
Senior writer Tammy Keith can be reached at (501) 327-0370 or tkeith@arkansasonline.com.