Principal Matt Davis has a wife, five children, two grandchildren and another on the way.
It makes sense, then, that when Davis, starting his first year as Chapman principal, was looking for a theme for the school year, he landed on “The Family.”
“I think about my personal family,” he said. “I would do anything for my family. Once you have that kind of love that comes from a family I think the sky’s the limit and that we can do anything.”
Davis chose this motto because to him family is about unconditional love, and that is something he hopes to foster at Chapman.
“I know there’s some misconceptions about families but ultimately, they love each other, they care about each other, and yes, they have problems, but they work through them because they love and care about each other,” said Davis.
Senior Savanna Simonds says she appreciates Davis’s attempt to weave the mottos throughout all aspects of the school.
“I really like the new motto and how they are trying to get us to incorporate it into the school year in order to make not just the grade levels closer but to make the school as a whole closer,” said Simonds.
Davis is aware that implementing this concept across the school will be challenging, but he remains hopeful.
“Everybody wants to be a part of a family, a part of a team, and I think by us reaching out that these kids will grab on and the school will become closely knit,” he said. “I know that this is a pie-in-the-sky type of thing, but I want y’all to enjoy coming here.”
Davis hopes that the concept of “The Family” will not just be known by the students but by the community and the schools around us.
“I want everybody to join forces,” he said. “When people hear ‘Chapman,’ they think of ‘Family,’ and they think, ‘Hey, I want to be there, I want to go there.”
Davis knows that building relationships is one of the critical components of being a principal.
“The goal is to look for and give the students something to rally around, to build those relationships with people in order to be more effective than I would be if I didn’t have these relationships,” said Davis.
One of the unique aspects of Davis’s tenure at Chapman is that students have watched him grow from teacher to assistant principal to principal.
At the same time, he’s watched them grow from freshman to sophomore to junior and finally to seniors.
Just like family.
“It’s so bittersweet,” he said. “It’s a tough situation because the relationship I have with the seniors and juniors I will never have with the sophomores and freshmen. I just want them to know that I don’t change. The same person I was in the classroom is the same person I am as principal, and I’m going to love and take care of all of my students. I want to get to know them, and I want them to be able to come to me and talk to me the same way all of the upperclassmen do.”
