Bevan Daverne recognized provincially

By John Watson Local Journalism initiative Reporter

Golden Hills School Division (GHSD) Superintendent Bevan Daverne is being recognized with the provincial EXL Award for excellence in school system leadership.

The award was presented to him at the annual general meeting of the College of Alberta School Superintendents (CASS), held March 17. 

According to a release, the award is granted to someone displays outstanding school system leadership and has enhanced school system administration over the course of their career. 

“One of the things that Bevan has done within our school system, he has a very clear vision of student achievement (and) excellence and has over the last, at least 10 years, has developed a research-based approach to learning,” said GHSD chair, Laurie Huntley. “We’ve seen this approach increase our student achievement and through all of that he has led the way, providing broad professional development to our school administrators, through things like our leadership and learning workshops.”

Huntley added that the description of the award given to the school division describes a nominee as being expected to have brought honour to themselves, their colleagues and their profession, given exemplary service to their provincial or national professional association, made significant contributions to the field of education through their service writings, or other activities and who therefore serves as a role model, a teacher to others.

Based on the release, Daverne is described as displaying a moral imperative for demonstrating success for all students, and GHSD’s implementation of its “powerful learning” instructional leadership approach reflects this quality.

“Bevan, he is a very calm individual, he is very politically astute, he’s very innovative, but I think most importantly Bevan has established a culture of trust in our school division and that extends to every employee, every student and parent,” said Huntley. “He has both the art and the science of leadership, and I would say his people skills are, by far, his greatest asset.”

Daverne also served as CASS president from 2019 to 2021 and liaised with the Ministry of Education to support CASS’s recent attainment of self-regulatory professional status. 

He was described by Huntley as exceeding all the qualification standards for a superintendent and that the division is lucky to have a person of his abilities.

Daverne himself was in Edmonton when the school division was contacted and was unavailable to comment personally regarding his award.