When I heard that I would be able to attend the CATE conference in Sacramento, I didn’t know what to expect. But when I sat down to hear Carol Jago, a face and name scattered throughout my school’s Holt textbooks, I thought, “This is really happening!” I had never been in a place where so many people were just like me—everyday we wake up, go through five or six periods of the same lessons over and over, and by the end of the day hope that we were able to pass on some knowledge to someone out there in our classrooms. At CATE it was a relief to see and talk to people like me who knew exactly what I was going through and understood my troubles and could relate to my triumphs.

The first workshop I attended was about classroom management, and I sat chatting to a woman next to me about what suggestions would and wouldn’t work in our own classrooms. I attended a workshop on teaching Shakespeare in the classroom, and now as I go through Julius Caesar and Hamlet with my students, I am able to use some of what had been offered—it was quite a treat to later hear my 10^th and 12^th graders insulting each other in Shakespeare’s verse! In another workshop, I heard about the great things that one teacher was doing with an online community, which was both inspiring—just think of all the possibilities!—and depressing, knowing that many of my students don’t have access  to computers unless they are at school. I even had the opportunity to sit down with one of my college professors to discuss mandated curriculum in our schools, seeing how similar, yet so very different education is throughout California.

However, what will stay with me the most is the reason I was able to go. I received the first CATE scholarship in memory of Kathleen Cecil. It was amazing that so many people knew and were affected by her, and not only her students, but other teachers. And that must be what CATE is about. As teachers we are not only teaching our students, but each other, and CATE gives us the opportunity to do that.

--Genny Garcia