David Klinkerman

Article and photo by Anthonette Klinkerman

Each year, the Douglas County Educational Foundation bestows an Apple Award to a teacher from the Douglas County School District.

One teacher is nominated from each school, and in a celebration akin to the Academy Awards, nominees will find out the Apple Award winner in March.

Local Castle Pines North (CPN) resident and Colorado native, David Klinkerman, was selected as the nominee out of sixty teachers at Mountain Ridge Middle School (RMMS) in Highlands Ranch. He will be attending the gala this month at the Wells Fargo Theater.

Born in Littleton, Klinkerman attended Damon Runyon Elementary School and graduated from Heritage High School in 1986. From there he attended Colorado State University, and graduated in 1990 with a degree in Psychology.

After graduation, Klinkerman took a job at the Cleo Wallace Center in Westminster where he spent two years as a mental health worker. The center served kids and adolescents with varying degrees of mental and emotional needs. “I was part counselor, part parent,” Klinkerman said.

It was at this point he realized he wanted to make a difference to kids as early in their educational careers as he could. “There were kids there who were smart enough to cause trouble to get attention. I wanted to reach them before they were sent to a place to be ‘treated’, so I decided to become a teacher.”

Klinkerman was hired by Douglas County in 1992, and taught fifth grade at Rock Ridge Elementary. The opportunity to see the world, however, presented itself, and he went to live in Spain for part of the following year. He then moved to Seattle, Washington, where he found himself teaching in a classroom for emotionally disturbed students.

Another move brought Klinkerman to San Diego and he took a position teaching in the Santee School District in California. He taught there for nearly six years, and there he met his bride. “She was subbing at our school, and one day she came into my classroom and that was it,” he smiled. Together they moved back to Colorado in 2000.

Klinkerman was hired back into the Douglas County School District at Buffalo Ridge Elementary, where he taught for four years before taking a position at MRMS in 2004, a year after his daughter was born. Teaching seventh grade social studies has become his passion, and he prides himself on creating assignments that challenge students of all skill levels to think creatively and globally.

An avid golfer, there are days he misses the usually temperate weather back in California. However, Klinkerman knew there was no way he and his wife could afford to live in the state on two teacher salaries. He considers his ability to live in the same district where he teaches now a blessing.

His favorite part of living in CPN? “I feel like I’m living far up in the mountains, but all of the conveniences of living in a city are right here.”