Jim Davey's infant and junior school was Stanhope Road, which he attended from 1920 to 1927. He then went to Westoe Central School from 1927 to 1932, and Westoe Secondary School from 1932 to 1934.

On leaving school he studied English Language and Literature at Kings College, Durham, gaining his degree in 1937. He followed this with a post-graduate course in which he got his Diploma in the Theory and Practice of Teaching in 1938, and started teaching at the Westoe Central School, in 1938. But he stayed only two years, leaving in 1940.

He came back to teaching in 1946 when he joined the staff of Cleadon Road County Secondary School and, after a year, in 1947 he joined the South Shields High School for Boys to teach English. In the first few years there, he continued his studies, and gained his MA in 1949.

During his time, he devoted a lot of his time in the production of The Atom, the school magazine, and he gained a strong reputation for high standards and integrity.

Jim Davey died suddenly at the age of 50. In his obituary, Bill Egner wrote:

Service, indeed, was one of the principles by which he lived, for he pursued unostentatiously those high standards which honest thinking had convinced him are the hall-marks of civilized man.

Hence there came an integrity which gained him the respect of staff and pupils alike. His was the judgment sought by many a colleague who wanted an honest and considered opinion. Many were the sixth-formers who appreciated his meticulous attention to details ... even those pupils who laboured under his disapprobation recognised that it was deserved and the measure of a standard imposed on self as well as pupil.