Karen H. Sánchez

Karen H. Sánchez, 79, passed away peacefully at home on September 7, 2024.

Karen was born on July 28, 1945, in Trenton, NJ, to William and Catharine Hess. Educated in the public schools of Hamilton Township, and engaged in a variety of activities including Girl Scouts, field hockey, cheerleading, softball and yearbook, Karen graduated from Steinert High School in 1963. She was the first in her family to attend college, and she matriculated at Douglass College, the Women's College at Rutgers University in New Brunswick, NJ.

At Douglass, Karen developed and strengthened her interest in international cultures and languages, living in the Spanish House, majoring in Spanish, and serving as Chair of the college's Spanish Club. In this capacity, Karen regularly organized social mixers with Latin American students at Rutgers, and it was at one of these mixers that she met Celso J. Sánchez, an international student from La Paz, Bolivia. Karen and Celso hit it off immediately - their shared love of dancing may have helped. After months of dancing, dating and attending Spanish language social get-togethers, Karen and Celso married the same month she graduated from Douglass, in May 1967. Their 1-bedroom apartment in Highland Park, NJ, and Karen's parents' home in Trenton, almost immediately became hubs for international social gatherings, and dance parties.

Karen started her first teaching job in the fall of 1967, at her alma mater, Steinert High School, though before she could finish her first academic year as a teacher, she was fired after it was discovered that she was pregnant with her first child. To make ends meet she got a clerical job with Chanel, but returned to teaching as quickly as she could in the fall of 1968, first teaching at Metuchen High School for two years, then at Franklin Township High School, and she continued in multiple teaching and leadership positions with Franklin Twp. Public Schools for 31 years.

During her 33-year tenure as a public school teacher, in addition to raising 3 children over a 40-year span, and leading countless Girl Scout and Boy Scout groups, Karen taught elementary, middle and high school students in Spanish, English and English as a Second Language (ESL), and served as District Supervisor for World Languages, ESL and Bilingual education programs for Franklin Twp. Throughout those years of motherhood and teaching, Karen remained determined to advance her own post-graduate education, earning a Master's Degree in 1986, and then her Doctoral Degree in Second Language Education from the Rutgers Graduate School of Education in 1997. Contemporaneous with all of the above, Karen also launched her 2nd and 3rd careers: First as an educational consultant where her work included helping write the NJ World Languages Framework as well as the Master Teacher Exam for World Languages for the National Board for Professional Teaching Standards, and then as a Teaching Professor and Graduate Student Advisor in the Education Dept. followed by the Spanish & Portuguese Dept. at Rutgers University. Karen continued to teach at Rutgers through May 2024 - the last 2 years while going through chemotherapy for pancreatic cancer. Karen's students, her joy in teaching and her intense passion for language and cultures across the globe fueled her spirit and brightened her light, every class she taught and each day she lived.

Karen's dedication to teaching and sharing her love of language and international cultures was matched only by her profound love of family and her limitless energy for travel.

Beyond her daily acts and expressions of love for her family, those near and those far, those related by kinship and those acquired through friendship, Karen was known (somewhat notoriously) for her relentless focus on bringing people together. Her unwavering, innate dedication to inclusivity was inherited from her parents. Whether it was Karen and Celso hosting a holiday get-together or dance party, her finding the narrow window in everyone's calendars to join for a weekend or at least an extended meal, or figuring out how she could shoehorn a family reunion into yet another adventure abroad, Karen's superpower was to make the seemingly impossible happen and continually reinforce the strong connections that define her family and community.

The third love in Karen's holy trinity of passions was travel. That fire that was ignited on a cross-country trip with her parents and brother in her childhood grew into an uncontrollable blaze after meeting Celso in college and traveling with him to meet his family in La Paz, Bolivia. In the decades since, from multiple further explorations throughout the U.S. and Latin America with Celso and her family, through leading several Rutgers undergraduate and graduate student trips to South America and high school student and Girl Scouts trips to Europe, to experiencing fascination with entirely different cultures in China and Japan, Karen's wildfire of passion for travel remained 0% contained through the moment of her passing.

Karen is survived by the love of her life and husband, Celso J. Sánchez, their devoted children, Celso W., Chip and Erin, their children's loving spouses, Trish, Naomi and Wilson, and their adoring grandchildren, Tomás, Gabriela, Celso Jr., William and Cora.

Karen's life will be celebrated on Saturday, September 28, 2024, beginning at 2pm, in Room 2125 at Rutgers Academic Building - West Wing, 15 Seminary Place, New Brunswick, NJ.

In lieu of flowers, please consider donations to the Rutgers Foundation Department of Spanish and Portuguese Gift Fund or Pancreatic Cancer Action Network.

https://give.rutgersfoundation.org/spanish-portuguese-dept/3027.html

or

https://pancan.org