TES Connect 2026 Summer

Cover Story

Lifelong Learning

Professional Learning: Three Perspectives on CATES 2026 By Ms Ann Lautrette, BSHS Assistant Head

Ms Leica Burley, BSHS Assistant Head Ms Katie Leahy, Theatre Teacher, BSHS

Opening Our Doors to Learning

The Council of Administrators of Expatriate Schools in Taiwan (CATES) was established to create opportunities for inter-school collaboration. Since 2023, CATES has organised an annual Teachers’ Conference to share practice across our schools. The conference is organ ised by teachers for teachers and usually includes a keynote speaker and a series of interesting workshops led by teachers from across Taiwan. This year, the conference, on the theme of Creativity, was hosted by Taipei European School at our Swire European Secondary Campus on Saturday, 7th March 2026. Hosting an event for over 200 participants is never easy, but it is hugely rewarding to see the conference you have spent a year planning come together. At TES, we are fortunate to have excellent facilities for hosting such a conference. We were able to use a large gymna sium for the welcome and the keynote speech from Dr Peter Gamwell, even bringing in a keyboard so that we could have a creative sing-along! We have classroom fa cilities that are superbly equipped for workshops - par

ticularly our movable, writable desks, which allow the creative work we do with students to be experienced by teachers. The main benefit of hosting, however, comes from the opportunities to connect with teachers from a wide va riety of schools in Taiwan, with different pedagogical backgrounds, different local and international experi ences, and different perspectives on education. Just as our students benefit from our multicultural and mul tilingual environment here at TES, our teachers grow from embracing the diversity of teachers in Taiwan.

Ms Ann Lautrette, BSHS Assistant Head

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