Delaware
Milford School Counselor Delaware 2024 Behavioral Health Professional of the Year – State of Delaware News
Shannon Gronau, a school counselor from the Milford School District, is the state’s 2024 Delaware Behavioral Health Professional of the Year.
Secretary of Education Mark Holodick and House Majority Leader Valerie Longhurst made the announcement at a statewide banquet honoring the district and charter network behavioral health professionals of the year.
The Mispillion Elementary School counselor said by building strong relationships with students, she’s able to understand how to best support them.
Gronau told the story of a student who “hated school.
“This feeling manifested in many negative ways like attendance issues and aggression. Their parent considered pulling them from school,” she said. “To help I had to understand the student’s needs by building a strong, positive relationship.”
Through check-ins and weekly counseling, she helped the child build coping and anger management skills. She realized the student didn’t feel connected at school and didn’t have healthy morning and night routines at home. She also learned the student’s mother had died, and her family was grieving. Gronau helped connect the student to therapy, worked with the child’s teacher on classroom behavioral techniques and met with the child’s parent to help develop good morning/nighttime routines. She also worked with the school’s family interventionist to connect the family with needed community resources.
As their work together progressed, she offered the student the opportunity to help her run a small group to help other girls in the school also feeling a lack of connection. Today the student is flourishing at school and home.
“From this experience, I saw true growth because the student believed in their ability to do well and had someone that believed in them,” Gronau said.
Teaching leadership development is one of Gronau’s passions. She created a peer leadership group project that trains fourth and fifth grade students to mentor first graders who need a positive connection at school.
“Students thrive when they believe in their unique abilities and are given the opportunity to be a role model for younger students,” she said.
Her assistant principal, Ashley Ganley, said Gronau is beloved by her students.
“Walking the halls, you can see the hugs and waves she receives. The students trust her and confide in her,” Ganley said. “During her workday, Shannon can be found providing individual and group counseling. Her students learn valuable self-regulation skills in small groups or whole classes, which is so needed in today’s classroom and society.”
The Delaware State Behavioral Health Professional of the Year (BHPY) program is administered by the Delaware Department of Education (DDOE). The program recognizes outstanding service by school employees who are health care practitioners or human service providers who offer services for the purpose of improving an individual’s mental health. The Delaware Charter School Network also is invited to participate. Employees considered for the award include:
- School counselors
- School social workers
- Licensed clinical social workers
- School psychologists
- School nurses
From those nominated at a local level, one behavioral health professional of the year moves forward to represent each district or the charter school community in the state program. Each district/charter network winner receives a $2,000 personal award from the winner’s district or charter school. The state program then chooses one person annually to serve as Delaware’s Behavioral Health Professional of the Year. State winners receive an additional $3,000 personal award from DDOE as well as $5,000 to be used for the educational benefit of his or her students.
Learn more about all the 2024 District/Charter Behavioral Health Professionals of the Year here.
Media contact: Alison May, alison.may@doe.k12.de.us, 302-735-4006
Related Topics: award, Delaware, education, professional, support, year
Keep up to date by receiving a daily digest email, around noon, of current news release posts from state agencies on news.delaware.gov.
Here you can subscribe to future news updates.
Shannon Gronau, a school counselor from the Milford School District, is the state’s 2024 Delaware Behavioral Health Professional of the Year.
Secretary of Education Mark Holodick and House Majority Leader Valerie Longhurst made the announcement at a statewide banquet honoring the district and charter network behavioral health professionals of the year.
The Mispillion Elementary School counselor said by building strong relationships with students, she’s able to understand how to best support them.
Gronau told the story of a student who “hated school.
“This feeling manifested in many negative ways like attendance issues and aggression. Their parent considered pulling them from school,” she said. “To help I had to understand the student’s needs by building a strong, positive relationship.”
Through check-ins and weekly counseling, she helped the child build coping and anger management skills. She realized the student didn’t feel connected at school and didn’t have healthy morning and night routines at home. She also learned the student’s mother had died, and her family was grieving. Gronau helped connect the student to therapy, worked with the child’s teacher on classroom behavioral techniques and met with the child’s parent to help develop good morning/nighttime routines. She also worked with the school’s family interventionist to connect the family with needed community resources.
As their work together progressed, she offered the student the opportunity to help her run a small group to help other girls in the school also feeling a lack of connection. Today the student is flourishing at school and home.
“From this experience, I saw true growth because the student believed in their ability to do well and had someone that believed in them,” Gronau said.
Teaching leadership development is one of Gronau’s passions. She created a peer leadership group project that trains fourth and fifth grade students to mentor first graders who need a positive connection at school.
“Students thrive when they believe in their unique abilities and are given the opportunity to be a role model for younger students,” she said.
Her assistant principal, Ashley Ganley, said Gronau is beloved by her students.
“Walking the halls, you can see the hugs and waves she receives. The students trust her and confide in her,” Ganley said. “During her workday, Shannon can be found providing individual and group counseling. Her students learn valuable self-regulation skills in small groups or whole classes, which is so needed in today’s classroom and society.”
The Delaware State Behavioral Health Professional of the Year (BHPY) program is administered by the Delaware Department of Education (DDOE). The program recognizes outstanding service by school employees who are health care practitioners or human service providers who offer services for the purpose of improving an individual’s mental health. The Delaware Charter School Network also is invited to participate. Employees considered for the award include:
- School counselors
- School social workers
- Licensed clinical social workers
- School psychologists
- School nurses
From those nominated at a local level, one behavioral health professional of the year moves forward to represent each district or the charter school community in the state program. Each district/charter network winner receives a $2,000 personal award from the winner’s district or charter school. The state program then chooses one person annually to serve as Delaware’s Behavioral Health Professional of the Year. State winners receive an additional $3,000 personal award from DDOE as well as $5,000 to be used for the educational benefit of his or her students.
Learn more about all the 2024 District/Charter Behavioral Health Professionals of the Year here.
Media contact: Alison May, alison.may@doe.k12.de.us, 302-735-4006
Related Topics: award, Delaware, education, professional, support, year
Keep up to date by receiving a daily digest email, around noon, of current news release posts from state agencies on news.delaware.gov.
Here you can subscribe to future news updates.
Delmarva Power objects to applying legislation to interim rate
The debate among commissioners over the breadth of their oversight on utility rates comes as the company has pushed back on the group, limiting its interim rate increase to half of its total request, even while it faced criticism from commissioners that it is “cruel” and “tone deaf” for continuing to press for rate hikes.
Delmarva Power, an investor-owned utility, serves 344,000 residential and nonresidential customers in the state. Its parent company, Exelon Corporation, is the nation’s largest regulated electric and gas utility.
Its customers pay a supply and a delivery charge for gas and electricity. The supply of energy comes from PJM Interconnection, a regional grid serving Delaware, Pennsylvania, New Jersey and several other states. Delmarva Power profits through the distribution fee.
Delmarva Power Region President Marcus Beal said they need to file rate hike requests to recoup money it spends on improving and maintaining the infrastructure.
“Our equipment is extremely expensive, the items that we buy, the transformers, they’re very large, complex things to build,” Beal said. “Even something as simple as a treated pole of a certain size can be very pricey, so we spend a lot of money on the grid itself.”
Under Delaware law, interim rates can be approved seven months after a rate case is filed, while the full petition is being considered by the commission. Prior to the legislation, 100% of the rate request could be implemented. The bill caps interim rates at 50% and allows 75% of the ask to go into effect after 12 months. The bill also puts limits on Delmarva Power’s infrastructure spending.
Delmarva Power spokesperson Matt Ford said the commission overstepped its authority to cut the interim rate as much as they did and the company has argued in its PSC submissions that SB 326 did not apply to the rate increase request filed in December because it had yet to be signed into law. Meyer said he signed the bill Monday.
“Delmarva Power further reserves its objections to the applicability of the legislation, should it become effective, including its impermissible retroactive application,” the utility company said in comments filed Monday afternoon with the commission.
In addition, Delmarva Power has objected to halving $23.2 million in distribution system improvement charges as part of the interim rate commissioners approved. The fee allows utility companies to recover project costs and depreciation between full rate case proceedings.
“My suggestion is, if you don’t like it, appeal it,” Iorii said.
It’s unclear whether the utility plans to appeal the order. Ford said they were reviewing it and its implications.
Tweedie said he hopes they decide not to appeal.
“If they appeal this, what they are essentially saying is, ‘We want to extract more money from our customers than the commission intended to allow,’” he said.
Delaware State Police have identified the man who was struck and killed by a vehicle while lying on the roadway in Harrington, Delaware.
On Monday, July 13, 2026, Jimmy Burgess, 62, was struck by a Chevrolet Silverado driving westbound near the 1500 block of Whiteleysburg Road.
According to police, the Silverado, which was operated by a 17-year-old boy from Milton, Delaware, was unable to stop once he saw Burgess on the road, striking him. The driver of the Silverado was not injured during the crash.
Burgess was transported to an area hospital where he was pronounced dead, said police.
The roadway was closed for approximately three hours while the scene was investigated and cleared.
The Delaware State Police Troop 3 Collison Reconstruction Unit continues to investigate this crash.
Troopers ask anyone with information about the crash contact Sergeant M. Long at (302) 698-8518.
Information can also be provided by sending a private Facebook message to the Delaware State Police, or by contacting Delaware Crime Stoppers at 1-(800) 847-3333
Where the music grew
Soon playing the restaurant piano became part of Leonard’s regular routine.
In early 2024, a friend encouraged him to record himself playing the old instrument and post the videos online.
The series, “Putting the Chinese restaurant on to jams,” featured Leonard performing R&B, funk and soul covers in the restaurant and interacting with customers. Before long, the videos found an audience online.
Leonard made one thing clear: It was never about building a following; it was about having peace.
As more videos were posted, he invited his friend to join him. In every live stream, viewers suggested adding more instruments and upgrading the sound system, which he initially thought was ridiculous.
“We started bringing speakers. We started to make music. We started to remix music,” he said. “We pretty much treated it as a public studio at that point.”
Word continued to spread of Leonard’s music and the Chinese restaurant where he played. Drummers, bass players, saxophonists and singers began making their way to the restaurant, transforming an ordinary neighborhood takeout spot into an open jam session where no two performances were ever the same.
“Everything is bliss. So it’s not planned. We just show up,” he said. “I may start a groove — and usually it’s like R&B, gospel, funk, soul, somewhere in that vein — and then it takes off, because the drummer may have a way that he wants to add to the groove. We all just feed off of each other, and then we create something. It’s almost like magic.”
Audiences became part of the performance. Some sang along. Others danced. Many pulled out their phones to capture the moment. Customers who stopped in for dinner often stayed long after their food was ready.
“You’ll have some people come in, maybe to order food, and then they’ll forget that they’re in a restaurant because of everything that is happening,” he said. “They may order food and then stick around for maybe 10 to 15 minutes and then leave.”
For Leonard, the biggest change wasn’t the growing audience or the recognition. It was rediscovering the confidence he thought he had lost.
“When I picked up the … DoorDash at the Chinese restaurant, that piano was my reminder of leaning more towards my creative side and not really pushing it all the way to the side,” he said.
“Me being able to bring things to life in a Chinese restaurant with a piano, able to reach a lot of people from across the globe, it definitely built my spirit back up.”
An imperfect piano; a perfect community
As the jam sessions grew, Leonard realized they were becoming something larger than just music.
“The piano being out of tune and not really in good shape … I actually thought it… would actually push more people away from it,” he said.
Instead, the opposite happened.
Leonard said he believes the piano’s imperfections are what made the phenomenon possible. Because the instrument is out of tune, musicians have to adapt to it and to one another, creating a sense of collaboration and shared purpose.
“We can still make it adhesive if we all agree to be in tune with the piano,” he said.
He hopes people leave the restaurant with more than a memorable performance.
“I hope they feel recharged,” he said. “They leave that restaurant feeling great, and they feel like they can do whatever they want to do. No matter what goes on in the world.”
The jam sessions have also introduced Leonard to opportunities he never imagined, connecting him with other artists and collaborators. He has even produced a couple of songs with British singer-songwriter, rapper and producer KWN.
“Honestly, I just hope it grows in a direction where it needs to,” Leonard said. “I’m just following God at this point, because I mean, to me, a year ago, I didn’t really see this happening. But it just happened.”
Leonard said he hopes to continue creating music similar to his jam sessions, curating spaces where strangers become collaborators and where art feels accessible to anyone.
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