It was a great honor and privilege for the author to have served as President of the California Council on Teacher Education (CCTE) between 2010 and 2012, as part of a six-year term of office. As an active member of CCTE for more than a decade before, during her early years as a tenure-line faculty member at Loyola Marymount University, she always felt CCTE was an authentic professional learning environment where rich dialogue and collaboration about research and policies related to the preparation of pre- and in-service teachers could take place with colleagues from around the state. As she looks back on these years, reviews the messages, reports, and documents she wrote over the course of that time, it seems that there were four critical areas of focus that were priorities for the organization during her tenure as President: (1) annual strategic planning; (2) collective leadership in teacher education policy; (3) ensuring a fiscally sound organization; and (4) sustaining and strengthening alliances. In this reflective essay, the author will address each of these areas and describe what occurred within CCTE during that time.