Dirk Oden

Biography

Dirk Oden has been an educator for over thirty years. He has taught science and other subjects in a wilderness-based program for at-risk students, in the traditional and alternative settings, and in the state’s first online school. He is the director for the Byron Syring DELTA Center, an Alternative Education Campus serving Monte Vista and the surrounding rural San Luis Valley. He is also the director of the Monte Vista On-Line Academy. Dirk developed a tool for incorporating Measures of Student Learning in the teacher evaluation process; the tool is being used by a number of school districts. He serves on the board for the Colorado Cyberschools Association as well as the board for Friends of the Dunes. During past summers, he worked as an interpretive ranger at Great Sand Dunes National Park and Preserve, and has taken students on wilderness trips to remote regions of the park’s backcountry through the Ambassadors for Wilderness program. During his spare time he enjoys writing, hiking, fishing, canoeing, archery, photography, and spending time with family.