Roots and Wings

Thank you::

May 9, 2006
Dear Thea Plesenth*,

Thank you so much for giving me the opportunity to attend this year's Professional BusinessWomen of California Conference. I attend Foothill College in Los Altos Hills and I'm 16 years old. I decided to leave high school early because I felt like I would be wasting four years of my life at a place I didn't enjoy. Sometimes I feel like I don't have a very good peer group at my school since I'm much younger than many of my peers. However, during and after the conference I really felt like I could count on women of all ages around the Bay Area to help me succeed in and enjoy my life. I very much appreciated the theme for this year's conference, The Power of Connection, since I feel like everyone needs to have connections with others, whether personal or professional, to be able to have an enjoyable life.

I participated in the seminars called "Making the World a Better Place," "Self-Esteem: You Can Never Have Enough," and "Managing a Cross-Cultural or Virtual Team." Just by the titles, all of the seminars sounded like they would be interesting, and they were. I found all of them thought provoking and fun. I attended the "Making the World a Better Place" and the "Managing a Cross-Cultural or Virtual Team" seminars because I am very interested in having a career that involves the whole world. At the moment, I am working on my Girl Scout Gold Award project. For my project, I'm creating a documentary called Connecting Youth to Youth. I have filmed a drama group in Johannesburg, South Africa, a group of students in Luebeck, Germany, and a group of deaf students who attend the School for the Deaf in Fremont, California. These two seminars helped me better understand how businesses and professionals are communicating with others from around the globe.

After the wonderful keynote by Dr. Bertice Berry I definitely wanted to attend her seminar about self-esteem. Her seminar was not only about self-esteem but about connection as well. During the Question and Answer period at the end of the seminar, one of the young women who won a scholarship from PBWC asked if she could find some women mentors to help her answer difficult life questions. Dr. Berry asked all of the women without children in the audience to come and stand by the young woman. And then she asked if any other young women would like to have mentors as well. I went up and received business cards from a number of incredibly friendly women. This part of the conference was a magnificent example of the power of connection.

Not only were the seminars, booths, and keynotes exciting and informative but I also gained a lot from the conference experience itself. I know that I will be very well prepared for my future business career because of all the conferences I have attended and plan on attending in the future.

Again, I'd like to express my appreciation for giving me the opportunity to have these incredible experiences at the Professional BusinessWomen California Conference. I hope I will have similar opportunities again in the future.

Thank you,
Cassie Dara-Abrams

*name has been changed (HA! I've just always wanted to do that)

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So wait, what IS this thank you letter about? Well, I attended the Professional BusinessWomen of California Conference in SF this past Tuesday (May 2nd) and I'm about to give this thank you letter to the Honors Institute (who got the scholarship for me to attend the conference) to be sent in to thank them for letting me come! I really did have a great time as you can see....

posted by Cassie @ 11:51:00 PM