 March is Women's History Month, a time to reflect on and celebrate the contributions of women in history and in contemporary society. This year's national theme, Weaving the Stories of Women's Lives, encourages us to explore how women's stories, as individuals and collectively, are woven into the fabric of our nation's history while our present. San Antonio is fortunate to be home to quite a number of women whose contributions and stories are part of our community, part of our history and part of our culture. We are honored to have the opportunity to engage in a few of those women this evening and to have them tell us their stories. At this time, it is my pleasure to introduce our program moderator, Ms. Eileen Pace. Eileen has been a news reporter with Texas Public Radio since 2010. She has covered a broad range of general assignment stories, investigative reports and features, and was WAI's first female news anchor joining Bob Guthrie during Morning Drive for more than a decade. She's a veteran radio and print journalist with a long history of awards for outstanding anchoring, investigative reporting, feature reporting, and sports reporting. We are truly honored to have her with us again because she did it last year and I'm glad she's here again with us this year and hopefully next year as well. And so it's my pleasure to introduce to you Eileen Pace. Thank you and Amito. I'm really excited to be here once again for such an important event. The women that are here with us this evening are the pillars of our community and that's why we're here to celebrate them. They are excellent role models for Women's History Month for women all over San Antonio. And I'd like to take just a couple of minutes to introduce each of our ladies this evening. Our first panelist is political activist Rosie Castro, a native San Antonioan. Castro graduated from our Lady of the Lake University. She has a master's degree in environmental management from the University of Texas at San Antonio. She is a Chicano political activist who helped to establish the political party of La Raza Unida and ran for the San Antonio City Council in 1971. She is the former director of the Center for Academic Transitions at Palo Alto College and retired as interim dean of student success. She has taught public administration courses at San Antonio College and graduate courses at the University of Texas at San Antonio. She facilitated the work of the Blue Ribbon Committee that created the West Side Education and Training Center. She is, this is my favorite part, the mother of twin sons, our congressman Joaquin Castro and United States Secretary of Housing and Urban Development Julian and did a brilliant job with raising those boys. And I have all boys, so she's like my title. Our second panelist is Mizakiko Fujimoto, associate conductor of the San Antonio Symphony. Born in Japan, Fujimoto holds graduate degrees in conducting from the Boston University and the Eastman School of Music. She is currently the associate conductor of the Symphony where she conducts over 40 concerts annually. Previously, Fujimoto was the conducting associate for the Virginia Symphony. She has also conducted the National Arts Center Orchestra in Canada as well as the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra and is doing a beautiful job here in San Antonio and we're so proud to have you. She didn't make me feel bad at all for being a fan of Paca Belcana like all the time. Our third panelist is Jackie Gorman, executive director of, I'm sorry, we're going switch places. Let me go to Dr. Yvonne Katz, so we just kind of go in order. Dr. Katz is vice chair of the Alamo Colleges Board of Trustees. Dr. Yvonne Katz spent 39 years in public education as a teacher, middle school principal, director of accreditation and associate commissioner of the Texas Education Agency and a superintendent for almost 20 years in the Harlandale ISD, Beaverton School District in Oregon and Spring Branch ISD in Houston. Earning her bachelor's degree from UT Austin, Dr. Katz graduated from UTSA and received her doctorate from Texas A&M. She was the organizing and first president of the UTSA Alumni Association and was the first distinguished alumna inductee. In 1991, Dr. Katz was selected by the Texas Association of School Boards as one of the top five superintendents in the state. Welcome and you do so much work. Now for Jackie, who is so wonderful on the east side doing so many great things for a community that's growing. Our third panelist is executive director of SAGE, which is San Antonio for Growth on the East Side. A self-described military brat, Gorman grew up on the Army basis where her father was stationed. After graduating from the University of Michigan, Gorman served in the U.S. Army as a military intelligence officer. She moved to San Antonio in 1987 when she accepted a position with the Texas Engineering Extension Service, a part of the Texas A&M University system. Today Gorman is executive director of San Antonio for Growth on the East Side. We all call it SAGE, a non-profit charged with revitalization and economic development in San Antonio. It's such a wonderful community. So I'd like to thank all of you for joining us for this very special event and we have a series of questions. So I'd like to go ahead and get started. Rosie Castro, who are what were the greatest influences along your path? Well, I think first of all, I grew up in a household with two women, my mother and the person that we call my guardian. My mother was an immigrant. Both of them worked in order to survive, in order to keep the family going. And so I think the fact that you come from a family where the women work, you right away believe that that is the role of a woman as well, that you are always going to work. So I think that's set for me the example that women work. I was very fortunate in having very good folks to model after. When I went to our Lady of the Lake, I had an excellent role model in Dr. Margaret Kramer, who was a psychology teacher, young with two daughters at the time. She did it all. I mean, she was into the bilingual movement and education. She was a teacher both at the college level and then in the community. Very active in politics and that's one of the reasons that I got involved. But I was fortunate to see strong women. I also grew up next to a young African American woman who was in the Air Force. And she and her husband were both really great role models, but she used to take me out to the bases. So in my mind, and what I always saw was that women worked, women were builders and producers in the community. And I saw no difference in terms of how a man and a woman should comport themselves in the business world. That's a very special way to be able to experience your childhood. Many women don't have that kind of a background to tell about that sort of equality. Does anyone else have a comment about that? I'd say, in addition to my parents, I had a couple of teachers. And every one of you in the audience can think back that you had a teacher or a coach somewhere along the way that believed in you and gave you a very special message about how you will succeed. We've all had them. And so one of mine was Mrs. Lowe. And Mrs. Lowe was about four foot nine inches tall. And she was a bundle of dynamite in seventh grade English. And I watched her, how she worked with the classroom because there were big old boys in there that were on the football team. And she would just walk right up to them and raise her head and look up at them like this. And she would say, son, don't you talk that way in here. We are not going to accept that. And she didn't raise her voice. She didn't get angry, angry, but she set the tone. And I really noticed that with Mrs. Lowe. And then I had Dr. Alvera Griffin in high school. That was, I grew up in Baytown, Texas with Humboldt Law and Refining Company right across from my home on the bay. And we had quite a few high school teachers back in the, that had doctorates. And I just thought every high school had teachers with doctorates. Well, come to find out that wasn't true. But in Baytown it was. So Dr. Alvera Griffin was the health teacher. And back then girls could not wear pants to school. That was not until way later on. And so she had us sit in that health class and we could not cross our legs. And she had us learn to sit and cross our ankles. And she always said, the people who sit on the front row will be the A plus people. And I told a couple of people of that today to come in and sit on the front row. So they, they both were high believers with me and helped me and molded me. And Dr. Griffin was also the supporter of Red Drum and Bugle Corps. And I was the president of that Corps at the high school at my senior year. First thing she told me, and I have remembered this and shared this all these years. She said, wipe the word I out of your vocabulary. And substitute we. Because it will take a team to do what you need to get done as president of the Lee Brigadiers. And so it's always been we all along. So remember that, especially our young people here tonight. Those are very wise words. I'm happy to hear that. Ms. Gorman, I'm interested to know if you experienced a similar viewpoint from your background in military life. Seeing different roles for men and women, or did you see strong women there too? Yes and no. Nothing is ever black and white. Yes, I saw many, many strong women. My mom, her friends, the women who were my Girl Scout Leaders, my teachers. So yeah, I saw many, many strong women. But I also saw many women who, while strong, were in that traditional women's role. I mean, when I was growing up before the 70s, on military bases, you know, my mom, my dad was an officer. My mom went to the officer's wives club meeting and she had on her hat and her gloves. And you know, it was, her behavior was a part of his evaluation. You know, how far he progressed in his career was significantly impacted on how she behaved. So from that point of view, I did learn about women's traditional roles. I can also say this, that in our family, excellence was not an option. It was a requirement. If you were not going to do it well, you weren't supposed to do it. And so, and that's everything that we did as children or growing up. My parents were very supportive of my brothers and myself. But they always expected us to do our best. And Akiko, what did you bring from your background in other countries, other cultures? Actually, I grew up in a household that was very traditionally Japanese, in the way that my father worked outside of the home and my mother worked inside the home. So growing up, she was a young mom. She was 25 when she had me and 26 when she had my brother. So we saw a lot of her and not a lot of my dad. He was the guy that was still sleeping when we went to school and that came home after we went to bed on weekdays. And on weekends, we did see him quite a bit. But he wasn't part of our daily lives. He was a weekend dad. And so my mother was a huge influence on both myself and my brother. My brother calls himself Mama's boy. And I didn't have that much time alone with her because he came 13 months after I did. But she has such a strong hold on me. She not only raised me but molded me. She was a teacher, boss, coach, everything. And if she were born, when I was born, she would have been working of course. But at the time when she graduated from college in Japan, girls didn't work unless or they couldn't get a respectable job unless your father had a connection in some big company. And she worked in journalism kind of thing for a couple of years and married and that was your cue to quit working. So my brother and I always talk about how she poured all her energy into us, the energy that she would have put into herself. And we sometimes wonder what would she have become if she worked outside at home but now she actually works part time helping out a friend's office. But, you know, she never, she told me that being a mom is a very convenient job. Of course we know it's the hardest job but she said it's very convenient because you only have to work with people that you love. And I envy her for that. And I forget how that changes your whole job description. Before she worked hard, if you paid a Japanese mom, and some Japanese women are still like my mom, mom, you know, stay-at-home moms, if you paid them what you would pay a non-family member to do, you probably couldn't afford them. The standard that Japanese wives are held up to for their housekeeping and cooking and child-rearing skills are, I mean, I could never match in any one of those three areas I think. They're pretty high standards. So it was a very different divisional labor but because of that, because we were mama's kids, my mom was such a strong influence and now we're good friends. But growing up, you know, we had our days when I was a teenager when I tried to rebel from her stronghold. She stepped away the minute I went to college. But until I graduated from high school, she was really, I don't want to say controlling, but she was a perfect mom and she still is. So I would say she was a great influence. I have had other female role models because when I was in college and starting to get interesting conducting as my thesis, graduation thesis, I wrote a paper after having interviewed about eight female conductors that were working already. So I do remember wanting a role model. But it's the people that are in your lives directly, your friends, your teachers, your family members that are male or female. And now my husband too, who's also a conductor, those are the ones that really had the biggest impact on me. Thank you. Thank you very much. So our next question is, what characteristics or skills set you apart and enabled you to be so successful? Jackie, let's start with you. You know, we can be very casual about this. If you ladies have thoughts and you want to interject, you can have a discussion. So don't wait for me to ask. Okay. Skills that set me apart. First, there's probably nothing I won't try. You know, I have not met the challenge that I won't attempt. Tenacity. Or stupidness, one or the other. Pinto, besides you're looking at it from, I think that's one of the skills. I think the other one is that I can tell the story. You know, I can use my words to help people see the vision. So I think that's another of those skills. And I think finally is that I can talk to people across multiple levels. It really doesn't matter who you are or where you are in your life's journey, you're how successful or unsuccessful you've been. I can generally have a conversation with you and find that common piece. I think that those are the things that have helped make me successful. That's so important in being able to do work in the community, to be able to express those things into network and draw people in. Well, one more thing. I forgot this one. I will always tell you the truth. It may not be pretty. It may not be what you want to hear, but I will absolutely always tell you the truth. Anyone else? I think one of the characteristics for me was always having a belief in myself. And that came from my parents telling me that I can do anything I want to do and be anybody I want to be. But I have to do my homework on it. I have to make my decisions based on my homework, which back then would have been data, collecting data to make your decisions. And I can remember going from Baytown into Houston when I was early elementary, probably first or second grade, because we went into Houston every two years to buy my winter coat. And you had to wear it for two years, no matter how much you grew. And so I went to Foley's and just loved this white coat. And my mother is just going, Oh my gosh, she's going to be in a mud puddle before we even get out of Foley's. And I remember her sitting there and telling me that I really and why I should not buy the white coat. And so then I had to figure out for two years how I was going to wear that white coat and keep it clean. And I remember sneaking it out to my uncle, my mother's brother who had a cleaning business, a dry cleaning business in Baytown because I did get it dirty one day. And I snuck it out, got it to him, and I think I bribed him with a cup of coffee and he cleaned it. But I learned from that white coat experience that I had to follow what it was that I finally decided on and make the best out of it that I could make out of it. And then one of the other things is I learned a long time ago to dream, to dream big, to look at where you want to be through a dream. And then backpedal, back plan those little steps that you have to start at in order to make it happen and then make it happen for people and for children and for communities. So I watched my parents do that. And I learned from them. You have that as an example. Very interesting. I grew up in a house that didn't have a lot of money at all. We made my clothes. My mother taught me how to sew when I was in the second grade. She said, I learned how to sew at this time. You're going to learn how to sew at this time. And so I made all my clothes up until the time I became a superintendent. And so, you know, you learn those lessons and you're able to then dream and make those dreams come true and help others make their dreams come true. That's a great gift. Anyone else? One of the things that growing up, you know, I was a latchkey kid and just about every label you can think of, sandwich generation, the whole thing. But as a latchkey kid, one of the things that I could not do was go to other people's houses. I had to stay in the house so that nothing happened. And so I wasn't allowed to go to the neighbor's houses and so I had to learn to get the neighbors to come to my house. That was actually a very good skill. It is. Because I had to learn to, you know, cajole people and entice them and figure out games to play and stuff that would be interesting enough for people to come over. As a result, that carried over into school. I went to a small Catholic high school and there was nothing to do in high school. We didn't have big dances and all of that. So we decided that we would start a youth club and so I was the first president of the youth club. As a result of that, we would always have to go make presentations in different places and I got to do the presentations. So for me, organizing, speaking in front of people, I've never had a problem with that and I think that has served me well. The organizing thing continued. In our Lady of the Lake, we wanted to start a young democratic club but you couldn't do that without a young republicans. And so we had to organize ten people to start the young republicans so we could have our young republicans. Fortunately, there were more democrats but we were able to organize both. That has been a skill in organizing the communication that I think has really helped me throughout life. Both in a personal way with my sons and always trying to invest in making sure that we were communicating well with each other. One thing I always ask of them is don't lie to me, okay? Whatever you do, that makes me the most angry is when people lie. And we had a good way of communicating with each other. In the organizing part, I think many of you that live in San Antonio have seen what the media says about the Castro campaigns. One of the things that I've always been proud of is that we are a grassroots effort. We organize from everyone who wants to be participating in those campaigns and making a difference in public policy. I think a lot of that comes from the early days of organization. Well, you can sure still see that in the work that they're doing even nationally. I think I saw Julianne in a picture the other day and where was he? Nevada? And he was standing in a situation, the picture was a very grassroots kind of situation. This tie loose and he's out there getting his hands dirty, rolling up his sleeves so that's real interesting that that stayed with them. Anyone else? What skills set you apart? Oh, gosh. You'd have to ask the San Antonio Symphony musicians. I would say, I mean, obviously my answer is going to be two industry specific maybe for the time being, but I would say maybe the three things that the musicians always compliment me on is and these are things that every number two conductor has to be able to do. So otherwise I wouldn't have kept the job, but you have to be efficient. You have to know how to run rehearsals with limited time, which I have less of than my boss does. And people compliment me on my sincerity because they're used to conductors, some conductors being phony, but I honestly don't know how to do anything but be myself. And when you're yourself, even your harshest critics tend to open up and start communicating and musicians are some of the most honest people you'll ever meet because they've been working their whole lives on one skill set, their instrument. And that's how they've been evaluated and that's what gives them pride. So in that way they're extremely honest people and to work with 80 honest people you have to be pretty honest because they can see right through you. Some orchestras say that the minute the conductor starts walking toward a podium they know if you're real or not, as a person. And it's that telling. They can smell phonyness from a far away, you know, far away. So those two things and what's the third thing? Maybe just my ability to talk to anybody. I have conduct on so many different series from kids to old people to everybody in between from pops to classical and so but I think that might come from the fact I moved a lot when I was a kid and changed schools a lot and then I'm bicultural so I had to be. And then within the United States I've lived in I think at least five different states in multiple cities and every time you move to a new state you feel like you move to a new foreign country. So I think that diversity in background having to always think in at least two perspectives has certainly helped me deal with and people always say why are you so calm under pressure why are you so calm when something horrible is going on stage or off stage and it's because nothing faces me anymore. I've been in so many situations so I guess those are a couple things that I get complimented on. Those diverse situations aren't very teaching or anything. What challenges have you experienced because of gender? Because of your gender? We all have stories about that but which ones are we willing to share? Well I'll start out. I've worked in a man's world all along and my father never let me use my gender for any kind of excuse. It was look at what you did what should you have done what would you do next time how are you going to fix this and so that was one thing just from growing up that he would never let me make an excuse because I was a girl. I was the first woman secondary principal in Northside School District and back then they didn't think we women could be secondary principals. I know that's news to a lot of you young people here but they didn't think we could do that as women and so I had been in a previous position director of special ed where I would go out to all the schools meet with the principals and all so they all knew me all the high school principals knew me all the middle school principals and so on so I remember we were having our back to school orientation meeting with the superintendent and we had to go and pick up the teachers' plan books and boxes and the teachers' grade books and boxes and all to take them out to the school and so I was kind of humming and hawing around where the boxes were sitting and one of the high school principals turned to me and said well now that you're a principal secondary principal you can pick up your own damn boxes cats and I said well okay having worked at the central office for four years I went and got our custodian we got the hand truck came and loaded up the boxes I helped him load them up we passed all the principals going out with the loaded truck of the thing, of full of boxes and I said thank you so much for reminding me that I am now a secondary principal so you have to kind of throw it back and you had to back then because you had to you had to create your position when you went into these new positions and I have shattered a lot of glass ceilings along the way I mean it's just that's the way my life is gone so I looked like a woman but thought like a man all the way and that was before Steve Harvey wrote that book because I worked with men I went and played when we were at meetings we'd go play golf, we'd go after the meeting and have a little hot toddy or something so I got really into how they thought and how they worked and all fortunately Title IX came along in the mid to late 70's late 70's Title IX is 42 years old this year and that helped open up some opportunities for our women but without Title IX we didn't have the opportunities that our younger women have now so working with men and being with men in meetings and all as a superintendent I dressed as a superintendent just as you're seeing me today I always have and so I've always had to help the men in the committee meeting or the audience or my presentation get through the curly hair, the curly eyelashes all the flashy jewelry all of the clothes and it takes about 2 minutes for them to do that and then we get down to talking turkey and men have to see that we women know our stuff that we have done our homework we know our data we know how to deliver it and that we don't personalize what their comments might be to us and if there's one message I can give to you younger women tonight it's don't personalize some of the comments that you might get let them roll off your back remember the story sticks and stones may break my bones but words will never harm me let that play in your mind when you're in that situation fortunately now women are in all parts of our country at all levels and all key leadership positions I'm chair of the women's chamber of commerce it started in 1988 because back then the greater chamber the Hispanic chamber and the north chamber that was just getting started didn't believe that women could even be committee chairs much less chairs of those chambers and of course history has proven that wrong we've had women chairs in all of those chambers now so I have experienced being in a man's world and I've just given it right back I mean it's been so much fun let me say that truly many things have gotten better since I was a young person and in the work force but there's still so much that has to be done when it comes to women women's rights and just for example in the United States of America we've never seen a woman president why is that? we may next time we will I hope see one soon but there truly still is a mindset that thinks that women are not of the highest caliber of leadership I believe that still exists you can look at all the data and see that yes there are women in the top 500 but there are very few corporations you can look at foundations anywhere else you want and we're still not reaching those heights for no other reason other than that we're women not because we're not prepared not because we haven't gone to Stanford or Harvard or these kinds of schools but because we are women and I think where you see that the most is now that you see the continuing fight towards minimum wage equal pay daycare and our abilities to have adequate childcare is not just a woman's issue it's a man and a woman's issue but it persists as a woman's issue I mean so I think just like with Latinos we've reached many heights but there's still so much work to be done even today in the workplace if you get a sexual harassment situation a male and a female what I've always seen working in personnel is that the woman will be sent away banished somewhere and the guy will be allowed to keep his job unfortunately 9 out of 10 cases that I've seen that has been what happens so there's still an injustice and I've seen every form of them I think my biggest disappointment when I was at the city of San Antonio I had hoped to my goal was to be a personnel director human resource director that didn't happen but I watched another man who had been kicked out of his job actually get that put in that job even though I was up for that job as well so I kind of gave up the dream of personnel and went on to other things but too often in the workplace the biases of oh she's going to leave the workplace because she's going to have a baby she's not going to be around long enough she doesn't take this seriously as another man would take it all of that still is there and it was interesting because when I was at the center I was encountered a problem with a woman who went off on the tourney to leave and you know my first instinct was say oh god how am I going to do this when she's gone and what are we going to do and I had to stop and think of to myself okay this is what people do they put women down because they stopped working for a little while at any rate that's all to say I have encountered just about every not being listened to in debate and discussion because you're a woman not being equally paid as men were so your job those of you that are just in the workplace now will be to continue to equalize that when I was at the city personnel department in the 80s I remember reading statistics about women's pay and at that point only 2% of women made $50,000 a year and of course I thought well I've got to reach 50,000 you know but now if you look at those statistics how many women make 100,000 a year and you know yeah I know that's just money but it still tells you a lot about the inequities that exist within the workplace unfortunately but we're going to get there the thing is that Ginny was let out of the bottle many years ago and we just make that progress slowly but surely we march towards that progress and that progress really liberates not only women and our children but the men as well I'm just wondering if you have some ideas about specific things that women can do in their own positions to make those incremental steps especially young women well I think Yvonne spoke to you know not to take things personally that's a very hard thing to do because my instinct is oh what did you say you want to say that again but there are ways to learn how to get along in a setting not by just keeping your mouth shut but by being able to get people to understand what it is or how it is that they are reacting negatively towards women I think right now there's a lot of legislation that is specifically would help women we got to get behind that legislation some of it doesn't look like it's ever going to pass but it will one day you know I come from a time when in politics it didn't look like we would ever have the opportunity to have the mayor to have a governor to have a president all of that has changed so I think that Yvonne you have to look at what are the social injustice that still exists in the workplace and then how is it that you can work towards justice both in the workplace and outside in legislative types of ways you know you ask about how do you take those incremental steps and I'll give you a story because stories are very strong and they help us as maybe reflect back on them when we're faced with the situation I told you I was with Northside School District and I was special education director and Clark High School was getting ready to open and I had determined already that I wanted to become a school principal and different ones knew that so I filled out an application I had had one year of teaching in an experimental school with middle school aged youngsters who had difficulties behavioral difficulties and academic that was my experience at the secondary level so I filled out an application marched right in handed it in to the superintendent secretary and said I'm applying for Clark High School for the principal and she nearly fell out of her chair and so they went on and on through the process and all and the day they were going to take it to the board they decided uh oh we better get Katz down here and talk to her because I was probably the only woman who'd put in an application and so they called me in and I talked to Mr. Cody and Mr. Jordan now that was my seed planting time and I am a huge believer in planting seeds you have to plant the seeds before you harvest the crops and we have to spend time planting the seeds and watering them and fertilizing them so that was my seed planting session the next year I was named the first woman secondary principal in Northside so you see you plant that seed, you work on it you go and talk with the superintendent you talk with the deputy superintendent you fertilize, you keep watering you keep doing those things it's those little many steps that you have to take before you get there so that's a story that shows you there's a seed planting time to do that I think what it is is that you have to dare you have to dare that's what you have to see women do right now there's not many women that run for office we have to dare you have to dare to say I'm good, I can do this and do it, make that application don't hold back don't be afraid, guys aren't afraid guys don't hold back sometimes they're the biggest louses and they still apply so we know that you need to be prepared but you've got to do it my career has been spent a good chunk of it in non-traditional fields for women in the military as a young officer my contemporaries were in those first one or two classes where they let women into West Point a lot of folks were not used to seeing young female officers and certainly not interacting with young female officers I was an intelligence officer and there were quite a few women in my unit and as a battalion staff officer I remember being in the field one time I was the S2 intelligence officer and we looked around, the S3 was a woman the S3 was operations, the S4 was a woman that was supply the S1 was a woman, that was personnel but the commander was a colonel we're in the field, and it was at Fort Hood you spent weeks in the field there but we were in the field and this tank colonel walks into our operation center and he looks around and he says well bang, colonel, you've got a battalion there's no sands up in here because it was all women it was all women but I also had some situations in the construction industry particularly where I was not only the only woman but I was the only black person that's a whole new different dynamic to that and I remember in Louisiana one time I was building for a production home builder and I'm in my construction trailer and my contractors have been going in and out and we're signing contracts and people are getting paid and this guy walks in and looks at me and he says I don't talk to the maid I'm looking around and I'm like well I don't know where the maid is but if you think you're going to get paid today you can talk to me and sometimes you've got to just give it right back at them I cannot tell you how many times I've been called the B word my usual response to that is thank you so much because you know they pay me extra for that you know you you've set your skills you've never the thing that I would tell young women though never use your gender as an excuse or as a tool you know you see women use their gender as a tool and it will get you so far but then you realize that that tool is not as valuable anymore and it's cost you some credibility so that's the advice that I would give them your gender is neither an excuse or a tool it is who you are do your job and do your job well it would be confident that you can do your job well and then don't take anything from anybody give it back to them don't own other people's foolishness such wisdom well did thoughts about having to balance work and family ever influence the things that you did in your career the path you took or change things for you? not me that's why I have a cat so I don't think that I made a conscious choice but I do think that some of my career choices that have have led to the fact that my family is a cat anyone else? I think for me it was difficult the thing that was a saving grace is that having the twins I had my mother living with me so she really you know when I was a personnel I did a lot of work around daycare for women and their children because I recognized that if I had not had her I would have had a lot more guilt I had guilt as it was already the other day I was having this talk with my daughter and all this Joaquin's wife who has one daughter who's about 15 months old and she was saying you know but if I'm not here and when I go off to work I just feel guilty leaving her by herself you know although she's got someone that takes care of her I think that's still very hard for women that's a very delicate balance but a couple of things have to happen we have to get away from the idea that women are the primary childcare takers it should be a dual thing and the more that we can get men to understand that I think the better it is I think that continues to be a hard thing and that we have to provide childcare for women and men so that they can continue in their careers and feel that the kids are secure that's part of why you have pre-KSA both for the learning and growth of the child but also to give parents a chance to know that their children are in a secure place for me it was hard but I was fortunate that I could do a lot because of my mother's fault I can go ahead have you experienced changes in your career path because of your gender and my decisions I wish I could say that but I can only blame myself in lack of talent or work for my lack of success but I do say that and of course I chose to marry a conductor so he works out of state and we've never lived in the same place so it's hard to have a family when the mom and dad live in two different states so that has been a possibility for us and I think the biggest thing for me is the pressure of the perfect mom that I grew up with and I will never be able to replicate what she gave me and my brother because when I'm conducting or studying to conduct I can't afford to be worried about somebody else because I'm so worried about me and my work output and I want to excel and I want to serve the music and musicians and I cannot imagine splitting my brain and my heart into two such important things so I might be one of those all or nothing people maybe one day I'm just gonna say I've conducted enough or something I'm gonna be a full-time mom I just right now because of practical things like child care and my husband being away I cannot and my own selfish in wanting to be a great conductor and still pursuing that but see this is the guilt thing that if I had to choose between studying or preparing and then saving a crying baby in another room I just don't know of course I'd run to the baby I guess but I can't even guarantee you that I'm the person who kills plants that people give me saying can't kill these plants and I have killed them and I don't even have a cat so I'm not even at that level so conductors are selfish people and I'm one of them we just need a long time a lot of me time we may not be focused all the time but we just need to be by ourselves and people always say oh it must be so hard being away from your husband all the time but honestly if he's here for more than 10 days it kinda gets hard and I start being worried about my stuff oh my god I haven't studied I almost need him to leave so that I have nothing else to do but work and that sounds very extreme but fortunately he's more laid back than I am but he just and I can't quit him because he's my number one advisor and my de facto cheerleader and my number one understander so I can't quit him so something has to give but I may never figure out this balance I may never be the balance I might have to choose one over the other and it's kinda getting too late for me to make the other choice but I don't know who knows ask me in a year and I might have squeezed in something but I don't think I can balance I'll start with a plant and then a cat and then maybe family that's very good thank you Dr. Katz did you want to address that I would like to say that my daughter has four children and we had a conversation after the first two and I said you know two is really a good number and so they decided to have two more and so when we talk over the phone they're in Denver when we talk over the phone and she is complaining about the balance piece and oh mom we're having to go to soccer here football there oh do you remember that conversation we had in Guam I I know that everyone has to find what balance means for them and balance for me might be very different as balance for you and that goes back to your organization piece you have to be extremely organized how do you get yourself together how do you get your husband together if you have a husband to help out how do you create that plan for balance and you have to have a plan you have to have a plan and in this day and time I think all of us are really working to have a good set of friends that can be family as well as our friends from work as well as friends there on either side of where we live and so you have to kind of lay everybody out and figure out where do you fit into my plan for balance and for helping and then implement your plan so I'm a country western dancer and you know country western dancing you dance around the dance floor around and around the dance floor backwards and it heals as Ann Richards said and you just really hate it when some couples stops in the middle of that going around piece and you have to figure out how you get around them so you never stop in the middle of the dance floor you never get pushed in a corner on your life's dance floor you're always out in the middle of that dance floor going around and figuring out how you get around this couple that stopped that's your plan B so you always are having to look at how do I plan how do I monitor my plan right now how do I monitor and adjust my plan right now and who are the people that I need to talk about helping me with my plan so to me that's how people look at creating the balance in their lives what a great analogy I'll never forget that then the evening has been worth it yeah how important is it for you to share stories of women's lives with the next generation Jackie there is not one way to be a woman we all have to find the way that we will be our woman in the way that you do that it's almost like a tapestry you know you pick something from this great woman that you've learned you take this from your mom you get this from your auntie you know this from your abuela over here or your friends abuela over here taught me how to make tortillas you know you take all of those pieces that you learned from other women all of those shared experiences and you weave them together and that becomes the fabric of your womanliness and so that's why it is so important that we share our stories and we find our commonality we find those places where we can support each other and we find those places where we can respectfully disagree with each other but we take those pieces and they become part of your whole it's very good we all do learn things from everybody that we meet and growing up it may be your friends abuela we have with the women's chamber of commerce we have four educational programs we have shifted from the 1980s of having to have an organization to have a woman's voice out there because now the other chambers and other organizations have women's voices so we've shifted a bit and we are providing education one of the four education programs is called the power hour luncheon and we have three of those a year and we ask our power women from san antonio who have literally undergirded and built this city some of them by hand literally built our city to come and share their story and their story is they have to follow the same ally your career pathway what you've done where you've been where you're going your vision what is your vision what are your goals that surround that vision what kinds of resources did you pull together to help implement your vision and your goals and then what have been the personal and professional obstacles along the way and how did you deal with them and one of our sessions there wasn't a dry eye in the luncheon place including dr. maria farrier who was our speaker so it's those stories that we share with each other and we can take a piece here and a piece there and you're taking the dance floor tonight and someone else is taking the twins being raised and someone else is taking what has been said here so it's those stories that help us reflect back when we hit that particular instance in our life and we can think back and it helps us remember and remember kiko or rosy one of the things that you know I like to look at a global view of things if you look at films right now and throughout the ages it has not been women's stories that are shown in the films for the most part if you look at biographies and literature it has not been women's stories that are up or most on stage I think we still need to tell our stories that we're still at that phase and certainly for latinas where we need to see our folks writing about women's stories because there's not enough of that out there it's important to share a story it could be inspirational people often say because I was a single parent they'll say you know it helped me to know that you could raise these two guys being a single parent they may not know that I had a great mother that helped you know but they say you know I know that maybe that gives me some hope that I can do that too or people talk to entrepreneurs that couldn't get that first loan because they were a woman and when I'm growing up your husband had to cosign lots of things that when people tell their stories you figure out what insurmountable odds they surmounted and I think there's a lot of very inspirational stories out there when I look at the city of San Antonio I went to Catholic school for 12 years and then another four at the lake I dealt a lot with Catholic nuns and they have always been a source of inspiration for me but big institutions Santa Rosa Hospital Incarnate World Our Lady of the Lake those institutions came about because for example in the case of Incarnate World in Santa Rosa there was an outbreak, a disease here and three nuns came in a horse and carried wagon all the way to San Antonio and started a hospital that we didn't have that's incredible but what do we hear? we don't hear the story of the three nuns nobody even knows their name we hear all these other stories and it's a shame that we lose our own history our own culture our own city builders and I think it behooves us to make sure that the names of and so many others are preserved so that if people didn't know them they would be somewhere and say well who is she and what did she do we really need to work towards that because there's so much talent here that are women that we're partners in building this city in building this state and this nation that they're still lost and I'm glad that the library is doing this kind of project we're looking forward to doing something with the Institute of Texas Culture too and we'll go back and make sure you're pushing forward the stories of women I find that starting with my generation by the time we entered workforce we were very lucky it wasn't legal anymore to discriminate so we don't have as good of stories that are like outright sexist so we're very lucky in that but I think if there's any more gender discrimination or bias it's very subtle things that you can't put your finger on and it's hard to call people out on those things but I think it is we always gravitate toward finding role models because if you don't see enough of Europe type doing something that you want to do you wonder if it's even a possibility so then you say well you're like me but you're older did you do it and how did you do it obviously you succeeded and that's how I started too when I wrote that paper in college but I find that it's more and more challenging to call people out on things because we don't leave footprints anymore legal footprints anymore and I think the next challenge is to figure out what are those subtle intangible things that still might go on in workplace but while we still tackle the obvious things that our society has but I do think at least in my industry there are a lot of women conducting now and until you've conducted the orchestra almost as good as the New York Philharmonic you're not going to be as good as the New York Philharmonic so until women get to conduct that level just below the New York Philharmonic they will not be asked to be the music director of the New York Philharmonic it's not a pecking order there's an order to the universe and you need to prove yourself at the immediate level below or at the same level at a peer institution to enter that and it doesn't matter so until women there are enough women to choose from at that level just below but in my industry I believe it's going to happen it might not be during my career span I think there are so many younger women entering the field but we just have to wait for things to slowly rise to the top so that they can take from a bigger pool because if you're the only woman and you're not the best you don't want to be picked either Well I'd like to thank everyone for doing this I think it's time that we open the floor up to some questions I'll get out of the way so I won't be with my back to you maybe some questions from the audience would be a good idea right now does anyone have any question for our guest Yes ma'am Next, or was it just kind of kind of day to day because we're saying these little steps to get to the position that you were in today for the rest of the day Well it sounds like Dr. Katz I'm not the career planner things just kind of happen and I take advantage of them but I would say that if your life your entire life just your work life if your life reflects the things that you are passionate about then those things will find you so for me I am passionate about service whenever I was at a transition point there were always opportunities for more service so I think that if you are true to yourself and love yourself with the things that you really love you'll find your way or your way will find you Yeah and I'd say that you have to prepare yourself for life for whatever it is the goal that you want to reach you need to be preparing for that but you have to be ready for serendipity to happen you have to know that sometimes you're going towards this goal you think and another opportunity comes in the way I take you in a different direction but to better places for me I studied to be an urban planner and I really enjoyed the coursework but we had to do an internship with the city of San Antonio and I interned with or I went to interview with the personnel department and I fell in love and I took that track a few years later I said earlier that wasn't going to happen I had an opportunity to go to Haku because education was a passion that led me to many other things I've been in public service I've stayed in public service for the most part but I've never been one to say okay I'm only going to my sons are probably closer to me I'm only going to do this I tend to say okay life has a way of taking twists and turns I've got to be open and that's the way I think you're able to get ultimately where you want to go I was I don't know what to do it's a cricket I have my timer with me and I thought oh my gosh my timer is going off when I was in my last teaching position I loved teaching absolutely adored teaching it was a fun with it but I also knew after sitting in the teachers lounge year after year after year hearing all of this gripe about the principal that I said you know if I could become a principal I could really help do things around a school so I went to UTSA enrolled in their first opening class and became a principal and then when I sat with all the principals I heard them gripe about the superintendent I said you know if I became a superintendent I could really do lots of things so I started planting seeds but what I want to get back to is not only my seed planting story but also you may not know what could open up where you are currently employed volunteer for special projects in your company volunteer for special committees in your company because then the people and there are higher ups that will be seeing you in a new light and will be seeing how you work with other people and what your skill sets are and then like Rosie said you know it might be a serendipitous kind of thing that happens in this way but someone comes in from the company and says we've been noticing what you've been doing the last year on this special project and we want to talk to you about so look at that those are some of those small steps that will help you make a decision about staying with your company and perhaps going higher or looking at what are some other things that I might be able to do to be surprised when those opportunities just pop up yes sir so one of the things I've noticed over time is that in general when another or a minority for example women have an issue integrating into institutionalized spaces many times the solution has been to just assimilate to the male, white, western, European kind of dress and way of being and I often wonder maybe that have come up through this space how have you navigated being able to keep who you are and understand that space and change that space that's something I've always wondered because I kind of base that myself on being a Latino but I know from a woman's perspective it has a whole lot of step issues so you know I have always done some unusual things but I have always been a girly girl and you go into my grandmother's house you think we're from the same family if you go into my grandmother's house in Detroit right now there is a picture on her wall it's a framed cover of the parade magazine from the Detroit news when I was an undergraduate University of Michigan I was an ROTC and I remember this weekend because I had stayed out way too late the night before and had to be in my ROTC stuff at like 6 o'clock in the morning and I kind of changed clothes in my car and you know we went off and my grandmother calls me and she says you're on the cover of this magazine and I'm like really grandma and she said yeah and I said what's it about and she's like the thing says the new army and so there is a picture of me with makeup on long red fingernails holding an M16 and so what I can say to you is you don't assimilate you be you and as long as you're good at what you do that's the key you is okay so I've done braids I wear bright colors it doesn't matter I'm me take me or don't it is that is so true to be you and because I've had women come up and ask me well how do you wear that stuff I could never do that I could never wear that necklace or you can you just get your necklace put it on get in front of the mirror and throw that chest out and say I can do this you have to practice sometimes standing in front of the mirror and saying I can do this I can do that that's that confidence in yourself that you have to have and then if you need to look at making some changes you know you have to take little small step changes in the workplace about it and again planting seeds when you're having little meetings about could we do this on this Friday could we do this once a month what do y'all think about doing da da da da da da da and start planting the seeds and then somebody will come to you within the week and say that was a good idea I think we ought to talk about that more and so then you start getting wheels on it and the flywheel starts to really roll and then you start to look at making some changes but don't be afraid to be you but when you're you when I was like this in Oregon where the brightest colors were navy blue with black and little bitty earrings that were gold now I'm not saying anything against that but that's Oregon and I walk in like this oh my gosh that was a culture awakening for those Oregonians and the earrings did get longer at the central office they did over the years but be you be excellent at what you do and be a leader there's a leader in every chair in here every chair has a leader in it so be that leader so we got our seeds we got be yourself we got serendipity and we got the plants go last we can kill the plants it's okay because we have things to do I don't know this is one of those evenings that I wish could just go on and on and on and I've really enjoyed it and I have about a thousand more questions but we want to respect your time and so ladies thank you so much for joining us this evening it's been my pleasure to be here and you know for women's history month I'm so excited that you guys asked me back again Ramiro if you have some closing thank you panel again for sharing your wonderful stories thank you for being inspirational not only to the women here but speaking for the other gender for men as well I was inspired by your stories the challenges but I'm most proud of how you all have come to challenges again thank you for being so inspirational and for being such wonderful role models Eileen I also want to thank you for again participating in this program and I hope you will join us again next year thank you for doing such a wonderful job on behalf of the San Antonio Public Library I would like to present each of you with a token of our appreciation here to present your gifts are teens from the IGO branch teen library council who represent the future generation of San Antonio leaders the teens have been assisting with staff and working with staff to put this program together and let's give them a round of applause thank you thank you I would tell you I also want to thank our audience and those who are watching the live streaming thank you for participating and for listening and tuning in to this program we hope you take a few moments to provide some feedback about tonight's event by scanning the QR code located on the back of your program your feedback is extremely important to us so that we can do better next time in closing I would like to invite you all to your reception just outside the doors I hope you stay and join us in some refreshments thank you again so much