Phyllis Davis-Jones (Honorary)

One Pittsburgh Public School Districts finest scholars, educators, and coaches, Mrs. Phyllis Davis-Jones, has served the school, community, girls basketball team, and all students, with distinction for over 30 years. 

Photo Source: Pittsburgh Post Gazette

Phyllis was recognized by the Women and Girls Foundation, Women in Sports: Leveling the Playing Field Award.  Phyllis was the only woman to receive this recognition that teaches or coaches on the High School Level.  Most people in the city recognize Phyllis because of her extraordinary accomplishments as the coach of the Lady Bulldogs of George Westinghouse High School. 

Phyllis has had her team in the Championship game of the city league play-offs for nearly every year she has coached, including AAA and unified championship contests. Phyllis has graduated all of her players and has over 40 former athletes who have played in college on scholarship, attended college on an academic scholarship, and are currently working in the field of education or coaching. Ms. Dana Nelson, former team captain and valedictorian a teacher/coach with the Pgh Board of Education, comes to mind as a former player under Phyllis, among so many other distinguished players. Coach Jones teams won 40% of all the championships won in the city in the last 27 years. USA today recently honored Coach Jones as one of the top 5 female women’s basketball coaches in the commonwealth of Pennsylvania. Her total number of wins is beyond 400. Since coaching she has never had a losing season. 

Phyllis has been recognized twice with national coach of the year honors and she has served on the prestigious WBCA All-America selection panel. Coach Jones is a member of both her Carrick High School Hall of Fame and the Western Pennsylvania Hall of Fame. However, what makes Phyllis so deserving of this award is more than her accomplishments on the court, they are her accomplishments with her other professional duties as teacher, and the role she plays in her community as a role model, community leader, and volunteer.

Phyllis is a scholar educator. Her advisor at the University of Pittsburgh, Dr. Mike Sherman, encouraged Phyllis to pursue research in the area of Pedagogical Cognition. At the time this research was very popular in the Social Science Field. Noted Researchers, Gaia Lienhart, James Voss, and Lloyd Bond, in LRDC at Pitt were the leaders around the country in research regarding this area of scientific research. Herb Simon a CMU scholar published multiple articles in this area as well.

Phyllis wrote her Master’s Thesis on Pedagogical Cognition, comparing Expert and Novice Basketball coaches on selected knowledge scales. Phyllis has taken her research and put it into practice. She has published two very important manuscripts, (Model for Success The impact of a Grant-Funded Program on an Inner-City Girls Basketball team, JOPHERD, May/June 2002, and A case study of school age female minority athletes who became pregnant, MAHPERD, Spring 2007). And most recently, a team of researchers, from West Virginia University and the University of Texas Austin, published an article titled “More than Basketball: Determing the sport components that lead to long-term benefits for African-American girls, (2013, Sport Management Review). The data for the award-winning manuscript came from Coach Jones’ “Model for Success” and interviews from former players, parents, coaches, and community leaders. 

As a secondary teacher, few have published their work based on sound research methodology, in top Scholarly Peer Reviewed Journals. This further demonstrates how Phyllis over the past 30 years of teaching and coaching has continued to build her classroom and athletic philosophy on sound research stemming from her master’s training. It has served her well. 

Phyllis also continues to participate in professional development workshops and community and religious service. She serves as a Deaconess at Rodman Street Baptist Church for over 29 years. Phyllis is a former board member of Youth Enrichment Services, Inc., a community-based non-profit located in the East End section of Pittsburgh. Over the last 15 summers, she has volunteered to teach an independent study class to 8 -10 teen mentors, who participate in a program called “Summer Study for Success”. Phyllis leads them through academic research regarding potential careers in the Health, Physical Education, and Athletic Administration. Students complete daily journals, research papers, and present before a team of adult professionals who jury the work of the students. Each summer she has the highest completion rate among her students. 

Coach Jones is the wife of Dr. D. Floyd Jones, and mother of three wonderful daughters, Carmin, Denise, and Melinda, and grandmother of Kassidy Jones.