A simple Google search will bring up plenty of others. When the youth minister at church once apologized for missing one of his high school games, Kooper reassured him that it was okay, that he did not depend on an audience: I play for myself, he said. I found an empty space to stand in the back. Participation in sports and a connection to school can have a profound protective effect, according to David Brent, a psychiatry professor at the University of Pittsburgh. Go deeper Andrew Solender The younger one would ask why he couldnt get McDonalds, which she preferred, on the way back, and hed explain that traffic made it easier for him to do them in this order. Hobbs Municipal Schools had an enrollment of about 10,000 students last year, but are down around 10%, loosing around 1,200 students this year, according to enrollment numbers compiled by Hobbs Assistant Superintendent for Data and Assessment Rene Cantu. Kooper was born in Hobbs NM on August 9, 2003 and spent his childhood in Lovington before moving to Hobbs with his family, Father Justin Davis, Mother Heather Davis and his younger siblings, where he was an honors student, athlete and student leader. Whats happening is that were taking away high points in peoples lives that give them reward and meaning. You cant use our work to populate a website designed to improve rankings on search engines or solely to gain revenue from network-based advertisements. The bureaucratic oversight stunned her. The district, which offered daily and weekly tallies of cases on its website, determined that the vast share of transmissions seemed to be happening outside school, as research was finding to be the case in other places, too. This confounded Hobbs school officials, especially because they could see open schools across the border in Texas. ), Statewide in New Mexico, the restrictions resulted in zero high schools or middle schools reopening anywhere in the state. Overall, though, the fall was going so relatively well that many students who had chosen the remote option at the outset decided to come back to school, to the point where only about half a dozen were still learning at home. My biggest fear is, you pull the rug on these kids, he said. And unlike in many other, more Democratic parts of the country, the citys school administrators had the support of many teachers when it came to reopening: A survey in late summer found more than 70% of teachers in favor of in-person instruction. Davis planned to put together a highlight real of his games which hed use to attract attention. There were counselors on hand, as well as Pastor Kinney, Sams dad. Thats what you think when youre 16: Nobody is dealing with what Im dealing with. Not to mention, he said, that the closures have simply given kids too many empty hours. He grinned. Man, this sucks, he told his teammates. Kooper was among the speakers, which surprised his friend Sam Kinney. All Rights Reserved. Creative Commons License (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0). Her sister Claire is a sophomore at New Mexico State University. Everything looks the same on either side of the Texas-New Mexico border in the great oil patch of the Permian Basin. The parents ran the political gamut: liberals from Baltimore, conservatives from rural towns in Pennsylvania. There are the pump jacks scattered across the plains, nodding up and down with metronomic regularity. Kooper Davis's passing at the age of 17 on Monday, December 07, 2020 has been publicly announced by Chapel Of Hope in Hobbs, NM .Legacy invites you to offer condolences and share memories of Kooper in I chatted with some of Koopers teammates, asking them how they were handling remote learning. But he knew he needed to work on his agility, which is one reason he took the practices so seriously. But the primary concern from a public health standpoint has been the role that children and young adults might play in transmitting the disease to others. That earlier pandemics victims tended to be in the prime of life, with mortality peaking around age 28. Doctors are concerned about possible increases in childhood obesity no surprise with many kids housebound in stress-filled homes while addiction experts are warning of the long-term effects of endless hours of screen time when both schoolwork and downtime stimulation are delivered digitally. For my older son, the baseball meant frequent traveling to tournaments out of state, in Virginia and Pennsylvania. To send flowers to the family or plant a tree in memory of Kooper Davis please visit our,

Kooper Davis went to meet Jesus on Monday, December 7, 2020. 

Kooper was born in Hobbs NM on August 9, 2003 and spent his childhood in Lovington before moving to Hobbs with his family, Father Justin Davis, Mother Heather Davis and his younger siblings, where he was an honors student, athlete and student leader. 

Kooper was very involved in and loved being part of his church family as well as being a Christian. 

He was an amazing big brother and had very close relationships with his younger siblings.  

He is survived by his father and mother, Justin and Heather Davis, his biological mother Sarah, his sister Kynlee, sister Kharley, brother Kroy, and brother Kohen, brother Tayton and sister Emara,  multiple grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins, friends, teachers, administrators, and coaches.   

In lieu of flowers, the family asks for donations in memory of Kooper to be made to Christian Center Church. For more ways to keep up, be sure to check out the rest of our newsletters. In August, they were allowed to hold practice sessions capped at nine players each not enough for a real practice, with offense running plays against defense, but better than the July sessions, which had been capped at five players. She took the coronavirus seriously, she said. You know, marginalizing our teens for other people that are high-risk, what do you pick? I seen a lot of disappointment, he said. Denver City is a humble-looking town, with a Family Dollar and no Walmart, but oil-and-gas revenues had allowed it to build a new high school two years ago. Its hard to be positive.. Koopers father and his stepmother Heather, who had been together since Kooper was nine, had considered transferring him to a school in Texas, as other families were doing. For them, the primary release from the hours staring at the laptop screen would be sports, and for us, the answer was clear: My wife and I would let them play. How much distress was invisible to parents? But the districts push to reopen was rebuffed by the state education department. My family was among those facing these decisions. After my meeting with Fuller, I went back to the church. He told me that he had been running through his last interactions with Kooper, over and over, searching for a warning sign, to no avail. Lost hope. Some players stopped showing up. There are the frequent memorials of another sort, to the victims of vehicle accidents. In New Mexico, mental health experts say, the factors also include high rates of depression on Native American reservations, and rural isolation in general. Speaking about the same . The state, led by Democratic Gov. Around 8 a.m. Tuesday, New Mexico State Police personnel investigated a double fatal, single-vehicle crash on New Mexico State Road 31 at about mile post 19, east of Carlsbad, in Eddy County. But at some point in ways that werent evident to those around him, Kooper was overwhelmed. Kooper said he didnt have his basketball shoes, but he would come the next day. The schools in Denver City, population 5,000, had shut down amid the coronavirus lockdowns in the spring of 2020, but there wasnt really any question about whether the 1,700-student district would reopen schools in the fall. In late January, Gov. Kooper was despondent. On Friday nights, high schools still played football, with fans in the stands. He was at a loss over what he and Heather might have missed. Whats going on with those other kids?. You cant republish our material wholesale, or automatically; you need to select stories to be republished individually. They had tried to make things as nice as possible in those weeks, with an online birthday party for the two kids, and an Easter egg hunt. And Fuller told me about the difficult weeks of the initial lockdown in the spring, when both she and her husband were feeling the stress of a loss of income. A lot are stuck in environments they didnt choose. Martinez said hed be glad to have Kooper and that he was welcome to join one of their four-person practice pods that very day. Nationwide, deaths by suicide in the 10-to-24 age group increased by half between 2007 and 2018, a trend that has been linked to multiple factors, from the growing availability of guns to the spread of smartphones and social media. The day after that, Wednesday, a fleet of empty school buses arrived at the high school from other towns, one from as far as Clovis, 130 miles away. Well, were introducing them to a new society here, and theyre rejecting it.. 877-845-6272. No, they said. He is survived by his father and mother, Justin and Heather Davis, his biological mother Sarah, his sister Kynlee, sister Kharley, brother Kroy, and brother Kohen, brother Tayton and sister Emara, multiple grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins, friends, teachers, administrators, and coaches. Even if New Mexicos overall numbers were holding steady, to those in Hobbs, three youth suicides plus a half-dozen other attempts by students in a matter of months in a population of 39,000 felt like its own epidemic. Davis, who lives in Hobbs, New Mexico, says she lost her son to suicide just weeks after. Kooper Davis's passing at the age of 17 on Monday, December 07, 2020 has been publicly announced by Chapel Of Hope in Hobbs, NM . He started playing organized football at age 5 and could not get enough of it. This memorial page is dedicated for family, friends and future generations to celebrate the life of their loved one. From Hobbs to the Texas towns of Seminole and Denver City is a half-hour drive next door, by the standards of the vast Southwestern plains. Sad, its so sad. Find service information, send flowers, and leave memories and thoughts in the Guestbook for your loved one. No products in the cart. Despite the cold, two dozen kids, most in their early teens, had come out to the parking lot and were now doing various kickboxing exercises spaced apart and with masks on under the guidance of some martial arts instructors. Later that day, he put up another Facebook post, his first since the one in October: With these tough times going around, I know there are many of those in need, and I want to give back to my community, he wrote. 866-495-5172. Lunch was still served in the cafeteria, but it never got crowded because many students went into town for lunch, at the McDonalds drive-through or elsewhere. The county had suffered 112 deaths attributed to COVID-19, which worked out to a per capita rate slightly lower than that in the three Texas counties abutting Lea. Lujan Grisham would announce that schools could reopen for all ages on Feb. 8, but at maximum 50% capacity, which meant only a couple of days per week, and under the condition that they would close if cases rose again. Its hard to imagine the pain this family is dealing with and the questions about what they might have done differently that will probably be with them for the rest of their lives. The CDC found that the proportion of visits to the emergency room by adolescents between ages 12 and 17 that were mental-health-related increased 31% during the span of March to October 2020, compared with the same months in 2019. In the pandemic year of 2020, though, the two sides of the state line might as well have been in different hemispheres. We would like to offer our sincere support to anyone coping with grief. Its crazy, said another, Carter Johnson. So that was the only thing that I can imagine what was going through his head at that time. Its been stressful at times, said the district superintendent, Patrick Torres. Funeral Home website by. Its trash, said one, Kevin Melissa. He shot to fame in the latter half of the 20th century and was an essential component of any and all of the jazz movements that took place at the time. Kooper was born in Hobbs NM on August 9, 2003 and spent his childhood in Lovington before moving to Hobbs with his family, Father Justin Davis, Mother Heather Davis and his younger siblings, where he was an honors student, athlete and student leader. Malena Moreno and her boyfriend, Pedro Gavin Garcia, were friends of Koopers from Lovington, New Mexico, where Kooper lived until he was 12. All rights reserved. Koopers father and stepmother, Justin and Heather Davis, left, and sister, Kynlee, 11. Finally, the nationwide surge in gun violence since the start of the pandemic has included, in many cities, a sharp rise in crimes involving juveniles, including many killed or arrested during what would normally be school time. The result of the abdication of federal leadership in 2020 was an atomization of decision-making that affected the lives and well-being of millions of people. This startled me, but not nearly as much as what she told me next: that soon after her own illness, her partner of 18 years, Abe, had died of what had strongly resembled COVID-19, though his initial test had come back negative. He is going to continue to use him to impact those around him, and Gods glory will shine through.. But the video wouldnt load right, so several students went onto the field to give impromptu speeches before the 175 or so people who were gathered there. Football Recruiting / New Mexico / Hobbs, NM / Hobbs High School / Kooper Davis. As the pandemic carried through the summer, worrisome signals started appearing across the country. They would come out with amazing answers. Kooper and Sam Kinney ribbed her about her tendency to lose her phone and took daily attendance for her. We are sad to announce that on December 7, 2020 we had to say goodbye to Kooper Davis of Hobbs, New Mexico. But the start of the school year arrived, and there was no school. Its not necessarily that youre experiencing abuse, though some may be. I had an open relationship with my son, he said. It was startling to pull into the high school parking lot and see dozens of teenagers strolling out of the school building, wearing masks and carrying backpacks, on their way to lunch. Its been hard to cope, period, said Jordyn Titus, a first-year student at Hobbs High School. Koopers grandmother, Cindi Federico, with Koopers 6-month-old brother, Kroy, and his cousin, Izaiah Chamberlain, 9. In "New Amsterdam" Season 3, Dr. Vijay Kapoor (Anupam Kher) contracted COVID-19, with much of the early part of the season revolving around his illness and the attempts by the hospital staff . Theres too much hurt, Espinoza said as I headed out of her house after our conversation. Local governmental and educational officials the vast majority of whom arent epidemiologists or experts on indoor airflow have had to formulate policy under intense time pressure while being buffeted by impassioned constituencies on every side and facing the reality that any decision would impose costs on somebody. Ive heard it all, Fuller said. And there are the astonishingly deluxe high school football stadiums. That may have an effect over time. Over the course of the fall semester, about a dozen of the 70 staff members in the Denver City school missed time for quarantine, mostly after testing positive themselves, forcing the district to find substitutes no easy task, but not insurmountable. Thank you for your interest in republishing this story. United Realty, LLC Happy Hump Day!! Because, I mean, were losing them. Students wore masks in the hallways and administrators did contact tracing for positive cases of coronavirus, but everything else went pretty much as usual, including sports. Kooper had always gotten straight As, despite a tendency to leave big assignments to the last minute. That was the last he heard from his friend. Like Texas, we have to learn to live with it, he said. He is survived by his father and mother, Justin and Heather Davis, his biological mother Sarah, his sister Kynlee, sister Kharley, brother Kroy, and brother Kohen, brother Tayton and sister Emara, multiple grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins, friends, teachers, administrators, and coaches. Theyre going to be taking care of us one day, and this is how were treating them? He noted that one student at the October protest had carried a sign that read, Im able to vote in your next election.. Kooper Davis took his own life on December 07, 2020. And these apologies are just some of the last words that loved ones will ever hear as they die alone.. Kooper was very involved in and loved being part of his church family as well as being a Christian. He charmed classmates and teachers alike with his playful ebullience. In many parts of the country, particularly cities and towns dominated by Democrats, concerns about virus spread by children has resulted in all sorts of measures: closures of playgrounds, requirements that kids older than 2 wear masks outdoors, rigid restrictions on campus life at colleges that reopened. Instead, he set his sights on Stanford, which excelled in sports and academics, and which he had visited for another football camp. There were other challenges, such as the time in August when a player on the girls volleyball team tested positive and the school made the decision to shut down the team for two weeks, just in case another player had been exposed. And one weekend late afternoon in November, when it was below 30 degrees out, two dozen boys went to school to play touch football, the closest they had come to having a game. The median age for COVID-19 fatalities in the U.S. is about 80. Kooper procrastinated, as usual, but now also found it harder to focus when deadlines hit. Kinney said he and the Hobbs school superintendent had been talking a few days earlier about the need to get kids back in school. When you put most of your things into achieving scholastic, and achieving athletic, and those things arent available to you, your whole life, every goal you wanted to achieve is being taken away from you, he said. Please contact. Sam was lifting weights with another friend in the small workout room that his father had set up. You are free to republish it so long as you do the following: Heather Davis comforts Madasyn Culver after a youth church service in Hobbs, New Mexico in late February. Kooper Davis went to meet Jesus on Monday, December 7, 2020. He liked his teachers, and they liked him. This confounded Hobbs school officials, especially because they could see open schools across the border in Texas. The buses had condolence messages painted on the windows: We are here for you, read the writing on the bus from Portales. Hawaii, one of the states least affected by the pandemic, put its threshold at 360 cases over a 14-day period. how did kooper davis of hobbs die. You cant sell our material separately or syndicate it. We should be more careful with kids, wrote Andy Slavitt, a Medicare and Medicaid administrator under President Barack Obama who was named senior advisor for President Joe Bidens coronavirus task force, in a Jan. 3 tweet. Kooper was born in Hobbs NM on August 9, 2003 and spent his childhood in Lovington before moving to Hobbs with his family, Father Justin Davis, Mother Heather Davis and his younger siblings, where he was an honors student, athlete and student leader. It has, instead, been left largely up to parents to monitor their children for signs of declining mental health as they determine whether to allow their kids to return to college or summer camp, to have a friend over, to go to the mall. But it was still hard. High school football practice has resumed, with some restrictions, in Hobbs. And unfortunately the Davis family is not alone even in Hobbs, New Mexico. I want him to tickle the babies while I go eat, she said. And the psychological stress that the pandemic has produced for so many Americans of all ages is unlike so many more acute crises that we might experience in life, said Nick Allen, a professor of clinical psychology at the University of Oregon. These contact sports are just too high-risk. I arrived in Hobbs two days later, just in time for the memorial inside Christian Center Church. The next day, a Monday evening, Kooper and his classmates held a demonstration for reopening school and school sports, one of several across the county that day. She said she had started hearing from many other families around the country whose kids were struggling, including a mother whod discovered her 6-year-olds plans for how to end her own life.