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Weekly UpdatesJesse Buttrick Davis is widely considered to be the first school counselor in the United States, because he was the first to implement a systematic guidance program in the public schools (Brewer, 1942; Gladding, 2006; Schmidt, 2003). Through his work in the public schools of Michigan, he became one of the primary leaders in the development of vocational guidance in the late 1800s and early 1900s (Brewer, 1942; Davis, 1956b). His pioneering work in the Detroit and Grand Rapids public schools laid the foundation for the professional counseling specialties of career counseling and school counseling.
Values and Beliefs That Contributed to Davis's Achievements
Davis had a bias toward environment over heredity, toward free public schools, against racial prejudice, toward equal access to education for women, and toward the role of humor in education. Although his mother was an elitist, Davis was a man of the people with believed strongly in the free public schools and the critically important role of education in a democracy. He was a very human person, concerned with the rules as well as how to break them. His memoirs are filled with anecdotes that show the humanity of people as he pokes holes through their stuffy facades. Raised by a patrician mother who talked of the "blue bloods" (Davis, 1956b, p. 59), he learned to eschew such attitudes and became a leader in the public schools, designing education "to meet the needs of youth in a democracy" (Davis, 1956b, p. 62).
Davis was also an inveterate "joiner" because he strongly believed in the idea of giving back to his community. "The teacher who does not take his place as an active member of his community is neglecting his duty as a good citizen and is narrowing his own field of thought and service" (Davis, 1956b, p. 230). A list of the organizations in which he held membership and the groups of which he was a leader and an officer would fill too many pages for this article. He walked the walk when it came to leadership and participation in his local and professional communities. Davis valued extracurricular activities as an integral part of a well-rounded education. He gladly accepted the role of mentor, even developing a leaders' club at Grand Rapids Central High School composed of presidents, captains, editors, and so on, of school organizations that met at his house monthly (Davis, 1956b).
When Davis founded the Grand Rapids Junior College and became its first president, his bias toward a more practical education emerged. "As a professor of education, I have often told my classes that when I was graduated from college I was fairly well prepared to live in the Middle Ages" (Davis, 1956b, p. 58). He had a classic liberal arts education that included (both high school and college) 6.5 years of Latin, 4.5 years of Greek, 3 years of German, and 2 years of French; however, he could not speak the modern languages, having read the prescribed standard literature, and could not even read a newspaper in those languages, saying, "I knew practically nothing of the century in which I lived nor of the workaday world into which I was soon to launch" (p. 58).
Much of Davis's (1956b) motivation for innovation in education was in decreasing the amount of time required for students to achieve their educational objectives.
Career Decisions and an Emerging Career Path
Davis's awareness of the need for guidance came, like too many students, as he prepared for high school graduation, saying, "But I could get no help from anyone" (Davis, 1956b, p. 36). His father did not want to influence him and just told him to get his baccalaureate degree first and then he could worry about an occupation. "Teachers were concerned only with preparing you for college entrance" (Davis, 1956b, p. 37). Finally, he succumbed to his peers and decided that he would go into electrical engineering at the University of Michigan with several of his closest high school companions. After a trip to the University of Michigan, and seeing what it was that electrical engineering students studied and did, he lost interest. Later, a kindly, older Baptist minister told him to steer clear of the ministry if he could do so with a clear conscience. With such indecision and his father's guidance, he took a year off from academics right after high school but continued his classical studies of Latin and Greek with a private tutor. And, although he did not have a career epiphany during that time, he became convinced that college was the path, but to exactly what he was unsure.
Davis was, however, more worried about his career decision during his high school senior year than he was during his college years because
As Davis approached his college graduation, he was, however, still without a career plan and not knowing what he was going to do with his life. He even put this question to the dean of his college, to no avail. As he entered Colgate University, Davis took all of the history courses that were offered and, by default, became a history major. "Following the influence of my Aunt Sally in my childhood days, I took all the history that was offered, just because I liked it and not with any conscious vocational plan" (Davis, 1956b, p. 56).
A Peak Experience
In 1895, during Davis's senior year in college, he had a "peak experience"--so named by Abraham Maslow (1994) because of the life-changing effect that it has on an individual's life and/or career. Professor Charles H. Thurber of Colgate selected Davis to teach a class of 30 boys in English history for an ailing faculty member until the faculty member was healthy enough to return to teach. Davis liked teaching.
Later, Professor Thurber took him on a walk and, after some pleasantries, queried, "Just what are you going to build as a career on your foundation?" (Davis, 1956b, p. 67). Davis ruminated on this for days and then another chance meeting occurred with Professor Thurber, who began to help him gather some additional career information by integrating Davis's expressed interests into three potential career scenarios: two that Davis had identified (minister and lawyer), and another that Thurber had discussed (teacher).
As Davis (1956b) described it, it went something like this:
Later, Davis found himself "lying awake at night planning and still planning (about what I could do as a teacher)" (Davis, 1956b, p. 68). He was astonished at what had happened.
Davis then sought out Professor Thurber to take another walk and inform him of what he had decided. Thurber was skeptical and asked "have you made this decision because I have said anything that you have taken as my advice that you ought to teach?" Following that with "What would you say if I told you I thought you would make a rotten schoolteacher?" These questions provoked Davis to anger, and he replied that "I'll show you some day" (Davis, 1956b, p. 69). Thurber laughed and right then offered Davis his first academic position as his teaching assistant.
In Davis's memoirs, after this story, he went on to outline the basic Parsonian career counseling process (Parsons, 1909), although he did not know that at that time: He wrote that Professor Thurber (a) "helped me know myself" (self-knowledge), (b) "opened my eyes to the possible fields" (gather occupational information), and (c) "made certain that I had made my own choice" (i.e., understand the relationship between these issues and make a decision [Davis, 1956b, p. 69]). "Vocational guidance was not known at that time, but it impressed the fundamental principles upon me in such a manner that it has been a major factor in my entire professional career" (Davis, 1956b, p. 69).
After College
After graduation from Colgate University in 1895, Davis applied and was selected for his first job--as a teacher in the Detroit Central High School, the same school from which he had graduated. He was paid $60 per month for 10 months--$600 per year. He taught six classes of beginning algebra, not his major, but all that was available that 1st year. In 2 years, in 1897, he was finally able to teach history and was assigned to teach Ancient History (as the least senior person), but it was his passion and he believed he was trained enough through his studies at Colgate.
Later, as he and another faculty member (head of the history department and principal of the 11th grade) were organizing a union in his high school to combat the politicization of the school (educational decisions being influenced by political leaders in the community), they were both discovered by the school administration. The other faculty member was fired, but Davis was elevated to take his school positions. Two other administrators resigned in protest of this and, with the fired faculty member, went off to start their own school. Davis struggled with the decision to resign too, but finally decided to stay and take over as head of the history department and as 11th-grade principal--a most important compromise that set the tone for his career. As 11th-grade principal, he began to identify the skills and competencies of and to develop the role of school counselor (Davis, 1956b).
In 1907, Davis became the principal of the Grand Rapids Central High School in Michigan. Through his work in Grand Rapids, he also established both the first junior high school as well as the first "junior" college in Michigan, the Grand Rapids Junior College, where he served as its first president. This new junior college was developed for the express purpose of providing postsecondary training in occupations, and, because it offered courses in the evenings, it presaged the adult education movement. In 1912, he was appointed vocational guidance director for the city of Grand Rapids concurrently with his other educational duties in that city.
The year 1914 was of particular importance in the life of Davis and the vocational guidance movement. With the 1914 publication of his book, Vocational and Moral Guidance, and his election to office in the National Vocational Guidance Association (NVGA [secretary, in 1913, and president, in 1914]), Davis traveled throughout the United States speaking on issues concerning guidance in secondary schools.
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