2026 Early College Summit

This session highlights the impact of early college exposure and how one Massachusetts school fostered a college-going culture for students, staff, and families. New Heights Charter School of Brockton has expanded early college access, with over 50% of graduates earning an associate degree while in high school and nearly all earning at least 12 college credits. Serving a culturally diverse community, the school created an accessible and equitable early college model that instills in ALL students the belief that they are college-bound from day one. Join this session to explore best practices for building a supportive college-going culture.

This "Pour Over and Problem-Solving" coffee chat combines hands-on coffee brewing demonstrations with critical dialogue to explore how to thoughtfully integrate technology while prioritizing timeless human values. Attendees will engage in conversation on topics from mindful tech usage to human-centered design, gaining ideas to leverage technology ethically and foster more enriching interpersonal experiences.

Craven Early College integrated AI literacy into its existing visible thinking framework to strengthen, not replace, rigorous, student-centered instruction. Through a phased professional learning model, faculty examined research on AI and learning, aligned their work with the North Carolina Portrait of a Graduate, and adapted thinking routines to support evaluation of AI-generated content and metacognition. Ongoing PLC collaboration and targeted workshops introduced tools such as Napkin, NotebookLM, Miro, ChatGPT for Educators, and Claude within a “learning levers” framework. The result is a practical, replicable model for instructional evolution that preserves academic rigor, supports equity, and prepares students for an AI-shaped future.

Link to Presentation: https://bit.ly/4us93Lm

Early college leaders are inundated with expectations—state standards, district initiatives, evaluation tools, PLC structures, and professional development mandates. How do we bring clarity to the complexity? This session equips principals and system leaders to design a coherent instructional framework that aligns Essential Practices, professional learning, PLC processes, NCEES, and school/district expectations into one clear, usable document. Participants will leave with a plan to crosswalk key resources with expectations and evaluation criteria, drive targeted professional development, and deploy a framework that sustains continuous improvement.  

In this session, Kassie Mount, founding principal of Dare Early College, will highlight the intentional steps that her team has taken to create a cohesive, mission-driven culture. Participants will learn how the school established a clear mission and vision, used the Next Generation Early Colleges framework to develop School Improvement Team (SIT) goals and professional development priorities, and aligned staff-learning with these objectives. Kassie will also showcase how student opportunities were intentionally designed to reflect the mission and vision, creating a unified experience that shapes both academic outcomes and school culture. Attendees will leave with actionable strategies to connect goals, professional learning, and student experiences in a meaningful, cohesive way.

This session is dedicated to making you a more efficient leader by automatingyour office tasks with precision AI. Discover the framework for writing effective prompts andbuild your own policy-aware AI 'clones' for consistent, rapid administrative output, with ethicsand leadership in mind.