By: Miranda Rester
Editor
With 35 newspaper and yearbook awards from last year alone to her name, Joy Davis accomplishes a lot in her reign as adviser of both The Warrior Beat newspaper and The Warrior yearbook. As the first teacher to ever advise both the newspaper and
Exceptional adviser Joy Davis poses with her yearbook and Warrior Beat editors,
(from left to right), Elizabeth McCullen, Caroline Pruitt, Mary Ryan Karnes, and Miranda Rester.
yearbook while teaching classes at OGHS and serving as a part-time instructor at the University of Southern Mississippi, Davis’s day is constant chaos.
“We’re on a three-week deadline cycle for a 12-page newspaper with 18 staffers. It’s a lot of editing with a short amount of time to work,” Davis said. Davis has been advising the newspaper six years and has aided The Warrior Beat in winning 74 awards, including her 2011 Adviser of the Year award. “There’s always room for improvement, but at this point, it’s a well-oiled machine. My staffers are dedicated, and there’s great leadership on staff,” Davis said.
Davis also is the site manager for OGHS’s school website, and she is the editor of the district newsletter, Excellence in Education, which is published twice each school year. In addition to her required duties and tasks as a teacher, she stays extremely busy organizing photographs, appointments with Bruckners School Photography, and communicating with the businesses in the community who are advertisers in the publications she manages.
Davis does all of these things, required and volunteered, with a smile on her face and no complaints. Davis suffered a severe injury in 1998 from a car accident that left her partially paralyzed with a loss of sensation and mobility in her legs. However, she doesn’t let this slow her down. “I realize that God is using me in great ways here at OGHS, and I am not about to let a few aches and pains slow me down,” Davis said. Although there are physical challenges she faces on a daily basis, she continues to give her best effort every single day.
Davis graduated from Southern Miss with Bachelor’s and Master’s Degrees in Business Technology Education, which is not related to journalism. Therefore, she’s had to learn how to run both staffs on her own through experience. With six years of newspaper experience behind her, Davis’s biggest challenge is overseeing the yearbook, which is still fairly new to her. “Yearbook is a lot of work, but it is so much fun,” Davis said. “I’m still learning, and the most challenging part is trying to teach myself how to do things and then turn around and teach my yearbook staffers how to perform tasks, but these students are very talented and devoted. They make my job easier,” she said. Her staffs, however, have prospered from her learn-as-you-go method. “Since she taught herself how to do everything, she has a very unique style of teaching,” Jordan Farrar, newspaper graphic designer, said. “Mrs. Davis is so patient because she understands what it’s like to be thrown into something and have to figure it out. She’s a great teacher.”
As a dedicated teacher and adviser, Davis stays late after school every day working with students to make sure that their publications are the best they can be.
With supportive staffs and a loving family, Davis is able to juggle all of her responsibilities like a pro and still remain sane. “I love my job and my staffers. Even though it’s stressful, I wouldn’t have it any other way,” Davis said
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