El Dorado teacher honored with prestigious education award
One more mark of prestige was added atop the tall pile of educational accolades held by Hope Cahill on Friday morning.
But for Cahill, 50, one of five New Mexicans honored this year with the Golden Apple teacher's award — and the only recipient in the Santa Fe school district — it was an elaborate surprise.
Students at El Dorado Community School were lured to the school gym Friday morning under the guise of throwing Jell-O at their school principal John Sais, who said a big announcement was to come.
' Somebody in this room is going to be very surprised here in a few minutes,' Sais announced, wearing a full-body plastic suit to stain-proof himself.
'Can I have Ms. Cahill come down please?' he said to the students in the bleachers, with Cahill standing at the top.
The students would later have their chance to pelt Sais with Jell-O, but the immediate electrified reactions to Cahill's name — without mentioning the award — proved they didn't need deception to show up and support a beloved educator.
'That's my teacher!' yelled one student, while the rest cheered wildly as Cahill bashfully descended to the center of the gym to accept the award.
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Richard Grainger III, right, executive director of the Golden Apple Foundation of New Mexico, presents El Dorado Community School science teacher/instructional leader Hope Cahill, center, with a Golden Apple Excellence in Teaching Award on Friday, May 9, 2025.
While it is her first Golden Apple, it's not her first accolade.
Cahill is heavily decorated, a recipient of the 2020 Presidential Award for Excellence in Science Teaching and the district's 2021 Teachers who Inspire Award. And she was one of two honored in 2022 as an Outstanding New Mexico Science Teacher Awardee by the New Mexico Academy of Science.
Her latest award is presented by the Golden Apple Foundation of New Mexico, a teacher-centered nonprofit that has been issuing the honors for almost 30 years.
Aileen Garcia, a former principal and educator, is 'probably the longest-serving member,' of the selection committee, she said, and one of the ones who sat in on Cahill's classroom.
'Hope is very humble,' Garcia said in an inerview. 'And her name, Hope, reflects the attitude she emits to all her students.'
Site-visitors like Garcia from the nonprofit sit in on a teacher's classroom after they've been nominated by a student's parents and selected as a finalist by a committee consisting largely of former educators and administrators.
Cahill is a relationship-builder, Garcia added, who takes serious stock in students, parents, and colleagues — and she uses those relationships to recognize how to motivate others to succeed.
' She's not just a teacher. She helps with the whole school. I mean, there's nothing she doesn't do,' Garcia said.
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El Dorado Community School science teacher/instructional leader Hope Cahill, center holding flowers, poses for a picture as students raise their arms in the air after Cahill was presented with a Golden Apple Excellence in Teaching Award on Friday, May 9, 2025.
Cahill, who has taught across subjects and across grades at El Dorado since 2012, is heavily involved, even outside of the school.
'It's about opportunity,' Cahill said in an interview. 'We want our students to be creative, constructive thinkers, and I think it takes opportunities beyond … the classroom to get them there."
Outside of her duties as teacher, Cahill also organizes the school's science fair, participates in the STEM Pathways for Girls Conference and serves as a mentor for the Santa Fe High School Supercomputing Challenge team, to name a few of her involvements.
'School was a place I've always felt safe, and I've wanted to be a teacher since I was a little girl,' said Cahill, who moved to Santa Fe from upstate New York over two decades ago.
She taught at Capshaw Middle School, now Milagro Middle School in the '90s, she said, before taking a break to be a parent. She returned to teaching at El Dorado Community School in 2012.
'It's never about being the best for me,' Cahill said. 'It's about being my best. and that's what I always tell my students too.'
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