WA-ACTE 2026 Summer Conference

In high-stress and constantly changing environments, teams can quickly become disconnected, overwhelmed, and burned out. This highly interactive session focuses on practical strategies to strengthen communication, rebuild team connection, navigate uncertainty, and help people reconnect with purpose in their work. Attendees should expect an experience centered primarily around collaboration, discussion, and interactive activities, balanced with guided reflection and practical takeaways. Attendees will leave with tools and experiences designed to create more resilient, connected, and engaged teams, while having some fun along the way!

There will be a lunch break in the middle of this session

This session will review what a "finfluencer" is, what kind of certification they do - or don't - have and how their advice can be dangerous - and at times, downright fraudulent. I will touch on various types of financial fraud as well, including how AI is being used to make it more difficult to determine fact from fiction, and what you and your students can do to keep yourselves - and your money - safe from scammers.

Washington State Registered Apprenticeship opportunities, what are the benefits of apprenticeship and what are the different programs offered throughout WA. How to apply for programs and the process of being selected/accepted into a program. The benefits of pre-apprenticeship and how that fits in with apprenticeships.

Apprenticeship Landing Page
Apprenticeship Preparation
Apprenticeship Program Public
Apprentice Resources

This presentation will review the Skate4Concrete Certification and share an example(s) of how it was implemented in the classroom within Washington Schools.  Teachers will share their experience and provide insight on how best to utilize the program within the classroom.  We will also cover the Statewide MiniConcrete Skatepark Competition for the 2026/27 School Year to be hosted by the Washington Aggregates and Concrete Association (WACA).

Students can earn college credit several ways—AP, Running Start, CTE Dual Credit, and more—but do they actually understand the differences? This year I spent 90 hours teaching CTE students what it means to earn college credit, how to enroll, and how to get their transcripts. It was A LOT, and I lost my voice, but students asked great questions and started understanding what these credits meant for their future. Join me as I share what I did, what worked, what flopped, and how you can use these resources with your own students.

Session Presentation Slide Deck

Come learn about a new opportunity for your high school students. Through an exciting collaboration the nonprofit CENTS is providing a financial education project competition with scholarship award. Students will receive mentorship for their project, which will be an excellent resume-builder and result in lifelong knowledge for the student. Learn more about this project and how to connect your students to this valuable real-world financial education opportunity during the session.

In this session, you’ll hear about free financial education guest speakers for your classroom, brought to you by the nonprofit CENTS.  CENTS has partnered with a working group of educators to develop new financial education curricula and presentations designed to engage high school students and teach vital learning objectives. The curricula will be aligned with the new Washington standards and will be classroom tested and peer reviewed.  We are committed to financial empowerment at all life stages. CENTS has newly designed presentations for freshmen and sophomores, in addition to existing presentations aimed at juniors and seniors. Whether your students are freshmen or seniors (or in between), planning for college, trade school, or entering the workforce, CENTS has tailored presentations to meet their needs. These interactive sessions make financial literacy relatable and engaging—giving students the tools to make informed decisions about money, debt, and their future.  If you have a financial literacy need for your classroom, CENTS can partner with you to reach your students with expert guest speakers, fresh perspectives, and classroom-ready materials. In addition, we’re flexible and can provide multi-day presentations to maximize impact. This is an excellent way for your student’s to hear a different voice to reinforce what you are teaching them.  In this presentation, you will learn about CENTS’ “menu” of choices to help you learn what works for your students and you.   CENTS was formed in 1995 to help people improve their financial health.  CENTS provides various financial education classes to various audiences including high school students, senior citizens, working adults, cancer patients, people who have experienced incarceration, among others.  All of CENTS’ programs are provided free-of-charge to participants, due to CENTS’ funding and support. CENTS partnered with the Washington State Attorney General’s (“AG”) Office to create Senior Money, a program to help senior citizens identify and avoid scams.  CENTS also partnered with the United States Pretrial and Probation Services to create a financial education reentry program.   CENTS’ curriculum was used as the centerpiece of Student Loan Awareness Month (“SLAM”), which was informally convened by the AG’s office and endorsed by a proclamation by then Governor Jay Inslee.  CENTS’ curricula is used at high schools throughout Washington and reaches thousands of students each year.  For more information about CENTS, please see www.centsprogram.org or email [email protected].

Career connected experiential learning sounds great in theory, but it gets complicated quickly: How do you recruit busy professionals? How do you structure the experience so students stay engaged and hit your learning objectives? And how do you make sure your business professionals leave feeling like it was worth their time? For 50 years, Washington Business Week (WBW), founded through a partnership between CWU, the Superintendent of Public Instruction, and the Association of Washington Business, has been answering exactly these questions. Today, WBW helps schools and districts bring 21st century skills to the classroom during the school year through its project based curriculum. In this presentation, you'll learn some of the techniques WBW has used to attract professionals to mentor students, workshop and activity ideas, and learn how you can implement WBW at your school or district, or provide supplemental learning options for students.

It's 2026. You've been to workshops filled with AI demos, you've used a Claude to revise a lesson plan or given your students an assignment to build AI skills. It still doesn't feel like we're preparing our students for the world of AI that they're graduating into, even if ChatGPT keeps telling you your is plans are "absolutely right!" In this workshop you'll move past the 101 level skills and into the 200 level AI skills that you can use and teach your students: A working understanding of prompt engineering - how to get AI to actually do what you want Practical knowledge of context windows - why AI "forgets" things and how to work around it Experience using artifacts and structured outputs to make AI tools genuinely useful in your classroom A clear-eyed look at the "future skills" experts keep citing and why CTE teachers are already better positioned to teach them than anyone else

CTE classrooms excel at teaching technical skills and industry standards—but what if we also taught students how those skills create value in the real world?

This session explores how educators can intentionally weave entrepreneurship into any CTE pathway by creating authentic learning experiences that extend beyond simulation and into real-world application. Participants will learn a practical framework for helping students identify opportunities, create products and services that meet genuine community needs, and explore the financial systems that sustain every industry. The goal isn't fundraising or turning classrooms into businesses—it's helping students understand how technical skills, entrepreneurial thinking, and economic literacy work together to create meaningful career opportunities.

Whether you teach Agriculture, Business, Construction, Culinary Arts, Graphic Design, Health Sciences, Manufacturing, or another CTE pathway, you'll leave with adaptable strategies for embedding entrepreneurial thinking into your existing program. We'll also briefly explore how authentic enterprises naturally create opportunities for student leadership and management, with additional resources available in the companion session focused on building industry-relevant leadership structures.
Because technical skills create opportunities, but entrepreneurial thinking creates options—and options create freedom.

CTE programs have the potential to do more than deliver credit — they can deliver credentials. This session explores how to intentionally design Career & Technical Education pathways around industry-recognized certifications that provide students with tangible workforce advantages.Participants will learn how to align curriculum, pacing, assessment, and classroom systems to credential outcomes while maintaining authentic, high-quality learning experiences. This session addresses implementation realities including funding constraints, scheduling challenges, student motivation, and balancing certification preparation with project-based instruction.Attendees will leave with a strategic framework for building credential-driven programs that expand opportunity, increase student engagement, and strengthen workforce readiness — particularly in rural or resource-limited communities.

Authentic student-run enterprises require more than participation — they require structure. This session explores how to intentionally design leadership systems within school-based enterprises that move students from workers to managers. Participants will learn how to create defined leadership roles, develop training and succession systems, build accountability structures, and cultivate student ownership within real business operations. Using a rural high school enterprise model as a case study, this session provides practical frameworks for empowering students with authentic responsibility while maintaining program sustainability. Attendees will leave with adaptable tools to strengthen leadership development in any CTE pathway.