Dan Clare

As a high school teacher for over a decade, Dan is a passionate educator dedicated to a

belief in the power of the written and spoken word, social justice, and environmental

integrity (which, coincidentally, are the three core values of the nonprofit board he serves on

as a member of the Wilma Dykeman Legacy in Asheville, NC). After earning a BA in English

from James Madison University and an MEd. from George Mason University in Virginia,

Dan and his family relocated from Washington, D.C. to Asheville in 2015. Dan is excited to

start a new chapter of his career with the community at FernLeaf!

When not in the classroom, Dan can be found performing music at local breweries, hiking

the Blue Ridge Parkway, running, reading, and consuming vast quantities of steaming black

coffee on the sofa with Blanche and Rose (his family's two corpulent kitties) and

Beauregard, his golden retriever puppy. As a champion of "the power of place," Dan enjoys

integrating Appalachian voices into his curriculum. Stories and poems from folks like Ron

Rash, Thomas Wolfe, Wilma Dykeman, Barbara Kingsolver, and Frank X. Walker often pop

up in his classes.

As a former USMC brat, Dan has also lived in Colorado, California, Virginia, Washington,

D.C., and Okinawa, Japan.