An English teacher at Eagle County’s alternative high school is a Colorado Teacher of the Year semifinalist

A Red Canyon High School teacher has been named a semifinalist for Colorado’s 2026 Teacher of the Year by the Colorado Department of Education.

“This is an honor,” said Kendall Van Valkenburg, who teaches English and is better known by her students as “Ms. V.”

“Teaching is something that was my identity before I became a mother, so I am really grateful to share that passion and talk about that passion in a way that could make a difference for people’s lives,” she said.

Van Valkenburg is one of 22 semifinalists who were selected from a pool of 419 applicants from 106 school districts.

“I became a teacher because I taught swim lessons in high school, and I always loved the moment when students got it,” Van Valkenburg said. “What drives me now are my students. I love to work with them on what they want to learn and build engaging curriculum around that so we can do our learning in a way that interests and engages us in our own lives.” 

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“Kendall’s commitment to her students has long been apparent to all of us in Eagle County School District. It is great and well-deserved for her to get this recognition from the state,” said Philip Qualman, the superintendent for Eagle County School District.

‘I grew up here as a teacher’

Van Valkenburg has been teaching in Eagle County schools for 12 years. A lifelong Colorado resident, she began her teaching career at Gypsum Creek Middle School at 21 years old after completing her degree in communications at the University of Colorado Boulder and earning her master’s in educational psychology from the University of Northern Colorado.

“I guess you could say I grew up here as a teacher,” Van Valkenburg said.

Teaching at Red Canyon had always been Van Valkenburg’s goal. “I love alternative education and thinking about teaching and learning in ways that don’t always involve the four walls of the classroom,” she said.

As her students transitioned from middle school to high school, so did Van Valkenburg. “I have been teaching some of these kids since they were in sixth grade,” she said.

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Van Valkenburg’s teaching philosophy revolves around using creative thinking, building relationships with students and a toolbox of effective teaching strategies to engage her students’ interests within and outside of the classroom.

“I really believe in students directing what they want to learn,” Van Valkenburg said. “One thing that I do every year is ask students what they want to learn about, and then I try to develop classes around their interests.”

Red Canyon’s alternative educational environment allows her to embrace this style of lesson building. “Our alternative setting allows for some of that creative thinking that I appreciate as an educator,” Van Valkenburg said.

“I believe that everyone is capable of learning, sometimes it’s about making the first step small enough and meeting kids where they’re at both educationally and emotionally,” Van Valkenburg said.

Van Valkenburg has also made sustainability central to her teaching philosophy. “Teaching is never done and one can always be better, every lesson, every day. So practicing the art of teaching in a way that doesn’t cause burnout is key for educators,” she said.

Van Valkenburg advised Red Canyon students who brought skate park idea to Gypsum

During Red Canyon’s May term in 2021, Van Valkenburg supported her students as they devised a plan to build a new skate park in Gypsum.

“I think that a lot of learning, and the best learning, happens outside of a classroom,” Van Valkenburg said. “Engaging in real-life community experiences is really the way to go, when life lends (itself) to it.”

The class resulted in the creation of Sk8 Gypsum, a coalition of around 90 students from schools around Eagle County that successfully brought the skate park idea to the Gypsum Town Council in January 2022 and raised over $80,000 for the project.

“The skate park in Gypsum is because of these students,” Van Valkenburg said. “That was something they were really passionate about, and I just built learning around that.”

The skate park opened in September 2023 after, in a rare occurrence, the project was completed both ahead of schedule and under budget, partially thanks to the students’ fundraising efforts.

Van Valkenburg was awarded the 2022 PBL (project-based learning) Individual Champion Award from PBL Works, a national education institute dedicated to growing and supporting project-based learning in schools, for her work on the project. Sk8 Gypsum was also featured on a national broadcast on PBS.

The skate park is just one of the many projects Van Valkenburg has taken on with and for her students. “I really appreciate everyone who responds to, ‘Do you want to be involved in my next crazy idea in our community?'” she said.

This school year, Van Valkenburg ran a Lego class “where students engaged in STEM activities and storytelling through their creations,” she said.

She also taught a stock market game class driven by students’ interests. “That was cool to see their interest in investing be something that led to their understanding of the research standards we were working on,” she said.

Colorado’s 2026 Teacher of the Year will represent the state’s 55,000+ educators at the state and national levels and will become Colorado’s nominee for the Council of Chief State School Officers’ National Teacher of the Year Program, honored at a special ceremony in Washington, D.C.

As a semifinalist, Van Valkenburg moves onto the second stage of the application process, which includes writing responses to several reflective questions, submitting letters of recommendation from community stakeholders and hosting evaluators in her classroom as she teaches.

“I believe in education, and I believe in our community,” Van Valkenburg said.

The Colorado Department of Education will announce its 2026 Teacher of the Year finalists in September and name a winner in October.