Crofton High School Counselor Earns National Honor For Her ‘Remarkable' Work

By William J. Ford, Maryland Matters

November 25, 2025

Danielle Crankfield has given the state of Maryland a first.

Crankfield, a counselor at Crofton High School in Anne Arundel County, was named the 2026 American School Counselor Association National Counselor of the Year last week. She is the first Marylander to win the national award that was started by the association in 2008.

She will be honored by the association in Washington, D.C., in January and recognized by the state Board of Education at its Dec. 9 meeting.

“Ms. Crankfield is an exceptional school counselor and an even more remarkable person,” Crofton High School Principal Greg Ryan said in a statement. “She empowers students to thrive academically, socially and emotionally, while also strengthening our staff by fostering positive relationships, encouraging collaboration, and challenging us to bring our very best to our students each day.”

Crankfield has been a school counselor since 2010, and has been at Crofton since it opened in 2020. It was in that year, according to the school counselor association, that Crankfield disaggregated course enrollment data to determine whether the school had a course access gap, particularly in honors and Advanced Placement courses.

The data showed Black and Latino students were disproportionately taking standard-level courses rather than honors and Advanced Placement classes.

The association said Crankfield created guidelines for middle and high school teachers to use when making core course recommendations. In addition, she collaborated with the testing coordinator and department chairs in several content areas to promote higher-level courses and honors and advanced placement electives that met students’ interests.

Over time, Crankfield’s work decreased the access gap for students so that the advanced lever courses more reflects the diversity and composition of the Crofton High School student population.

“Danielle represents the very best in professional school counseling from her commitment to her students’ academic, college/career and social/emotional success, to her reputation among her peers as Crofton High School’s ‘North Star,’” Molly McCloskey, a member of the counselor of the year selection committee, said in a statement. “Her excellence is not only in what she does, but in the way she does it – authentically and with an eye toward meaningful, measurable results.”

Crankfield credited her colleagues and her students for her success.

“I stand alongside an amazing team with strong district support that I could not do this work without. This work will continue and we will make the program even better,” Crankfield said in a statement.

.To every student, whether on my caseload or not, this award is because of you. Your success. Your ability to do what you want in this world is what motivates me every single day,” she said in her statement. “This is for you.”

The award was open to state school counselors of the year from all 50 states. Crankfield was one of five national finalists, who included elementary school counselors from Woodbridge, Virginia, and Youngsville, Louisiana; a middle school counselor from Burlington, North Carolina; and a high school counselor from Kahului, Hawaii.

All five will be honored in Washington, D.C., in January. They will also participate in online events during National School Counseling Week starting Feb. 2-6.