APS Rising Educator Summit 2026

Ready to move beyond paperwork and get to the heart of achievement? Join this energetic, hands-on session to transform how we approach student support. Instead of seeing accommodations as a "compliance check," we’ll explore how the APS Promising Practice of Student Success Systems serves as a bridge to high-level mastery. What You’ll Experience: Collaborative Inquiry: Work with peers across grade levels to solve real-world classroom challenge. The "Support Toolkit": Get hands-on with evidence-based strategies, like tiered graphic organizers and visual anchors, that actually work. Data-Driven Action: Use a cycle of inquiry to ensure interventions are precise and effective. The Takeaway: Leave with a clear roadmap for implementing accommodations with fidelity, ensuring every student—regardless of their starting point—can access grade-level content and feel empowered. Let’s turn high expectations into tangible success!

We will explore cognitive science and memory research to challenge conventional wisdom about feedback. Participants will learn to use digital tools for efficient formative assessments while shifting the cognitive heavy lifting back to students. Finally, the session outlines how educators can leverage peer observations, and student surveys to systematically improve their own instructional practices.

Is math a subject to be feared or a playground to be explored? This session focuses on Mathematical Mindsets—the 8 Standards for Mathematical Practice that transform students into problem solvers. We move beyond "getting the right answer" to embracing persistence and logical reasoning. You’ll learn to create "low floor, high ceiling" environments where every student thinks like a mathematician! This is a hands-on deep dive. You’ll spend the session immersed in games that prioritize strategy and perseverance. We will explore how to transition students from performing basic operations to tackling deeper, more complex problem-solving scenarios. Make & Take Masters: Ready-to-print logic game masters for your classroom. Beast Academy Intro: Explore this engaging program available from the APS Gifted Resource Library (Best for Gifted classroom but also helpful in enrichment, grades 2+). Door prize drawing: a Beast Academy Puzzle Book!

How can students use their school campus to investigate real environmental questions and connect their learning to larger ecosystems? In this interactive session, educators will explore a 7th Grade Campus Ecosystem Monitoring Project in collaboration with the Bosque Ecosystem Monitoring Program (BEMP) and a field experience at Valle de Oro National Wildlife Refuge. Participants will engage in hands-on investigations using real ecosystem data, including water quality, biodiversity, and weather patterns, while practicing simple, repeatable monitoring protocols that can be implemented on any campus. Teachers will design student-centered investigations that connect classroom data collection to field-based learning, including studies of Rio Grande cottonwood decline. This session prioritizes 7th grade teams from Polk, Harrison, and Ernie Pyle Middle Schools as part of a pilot cohort, with additional schools welcome as the project expands.

True educational impact happens when we know how to navigate the systems around us—and how to change them for the better. This track is a masterclass in professional advancement and structural strategy. Demystify your career path by getting in-person roadmap guidance from the APS Licensure team, and discover how completing your National Boards can seamlessly elevate your formative assessment practices. Simultaneously, look at institutional growth by diving deep into the tech side of student interventions with MTSS tools in Synergy, learning how to launch a Career Technical Student Organization (CTSO), and joining a collaborative, honest session to reimagine school evaluation systems so they actually reflect the true gains of your students and community. Join us in the Sky Bridge for a dynamic and interactive series of poster sessions designed to spark innovation and provide practical solutions for today’s educators. These sessions offer a unique opportunity to engage directly with experts, explore visual data, and take away actionable strategies in a concise, high-impact format.

Optimizing Student Support Systems using MTSS within Synergy: Effective student intervention requires a seamless blend of strategy and technology. This course provides a comprehensive deep dive into our Multi-Tiered System of Supports (MTSS) framework, focusing on practical tools like Behavior Points, Observations, Check-In/Check-Out (CICO), and MTSS Plans. Participants will leave with the ability to navigate the MTSS modules and leverage rewards systems to foster a positive school culture. Patricia Salaz, Jude Garcia and Nicole Sullo

Navigating the APS Licensure Maze: Don't navigate the path to advancement alone. Whether you’re advancing your license, navigating the alternative licensure route, or adding an endorsement, our Licensure team is here to help you skip the paperwork headaches. Get your questions answered in person and leave with a clear roadmap to your goals. Kerry Wellborn

So You Want to Start A Career Technical Student Organization!: Benefits of a Career Technical Student Organization and how it will enhance your CTE Program. Which CTSO will fit you best? Steps to start, funding support and more. Richard Faulkner

Reimagining Schools and School Evaluation: Are you tired of "data driven" this and "data driven" that being dictated to you from on high? Do you get the feeling that this supposed data does not accurately reflect the gains your students are making? You are not alone! During this collaborative session, we will critically examine our state and district evaluation system learn why certain things are necessary user ESSA while also trying to reimage what kind of evaluation might empower our students and communities. If time permits we will also discuss how to visually represent the data to reach more people in our communities. Athena Torretti

National Boards and Formative Assessment: A Match Made in Heaven?: Have you been thinking of doing your National Boards but have been hesitant because you are nervous about the video portion? I was there once too, but then I was asked to implement a new technology into my classroom and then it started to make more sense. Come hear about my own journey to National Boards and why I think everyone can benefit from going through this process. I will share some of the lessons I learned along the way about lesson planning and how to integrate Formative Assessments more seamlessly into the classroom. Sarah Schmitz

This session is focused for IXL users who have some IXL experience. Participants will deep dive into IXL’s adaptive curriculum, classroom engagement tools, and actionable Analytics. They will learn how to adapt instruction and support students using up-to-the-minute insights.

True innovation happens when we break down silos and design together. This track is designed for school teams eager to deepen collaboration, enrich student experiences, and unite their communities. Discover how to build a resilient, spirited adult team culture that fuels collective efficacy. Then, learn how to use shared interdisciplinary themes to elevate student voices across subjects, redesign beloved school traditions into rich academic milestones, and launch public exhibitions that proudly celebrate student work with families and community partners. Join us to transform how your school learns, collaborates, and celebrates together. Join us in La Sala (lower West Side) for a dynamic and interactive series of poster sessions designed to spark innovation and provide practical solutions for today’s educators. These sessions offer a unique opportunity to engage directly with experts, explore visual data, and take away actionable strategies in a concise, high-impact format.

Building Team Community and Spirit: This session supports teams in intentionally building community and spirit—laying the groundwork for collaboration that sustains both adults and students. Participants explore how team culture is shaped through shared purpose, rituals, and everyday interactions, and how a strong sense of belonging fuels resilience, innovation, and collective efficacy. Amber Day, Chelsea O’Connell, Andrea Roman

Interdisciplinary Exhibition That Engages the Whole Community: This session guides teams through the process of designing interdisciplinary exhibitions that celebrate student learning and invite broader community participation. Participants consider logistical planning, role clarity, and strategies for engaging families and partners while centering authentic student work and voice. Amber Day, Megan Arling, Maria Tafoya-Trotter, Christina Chacon

Tradition Meets Redesign: How Interdisciplinary Learning Enhances Beloved School Experiences: Rather than replacing cherished traditions, this session invites teams to see them as anchors for redesign. Participants explore how interdisciplinary learning, co‑teaching, and student choice can deepen the impact of events like Greek Night or 5th‑grade transition experiences—making them more meaningful, inclusive, and academically rich. Amber Day, Bill Barnes, Terresa Roybal, Lisa Aragon, Susan Savage, Julieana Reed

VOICES: Designing Learning Through Shared Themes Across Disciplines: This session focuses on designing learning around powerful, resonant themes that span disciplines and elevate student voice. Teams explore how shared inquiry questions and themes can unify curriculum, deepen relevance, and create space for authentic student expression through products and performances. Amber Day, Annette Youngren

How do we support our students who are new to English in engaging in student-student discussion and academic discourse? In this hands-on session, participants will experience multiple, immediately applicable strategies for supporting multilingual (EL) students in participating in classroom discussions. Participants will have time to plan how to implement these strategies in their classrooms, and will leave with templates for protocols, strategies, and scaffolds for students. This session is mainly geared towards high school and middle school educators.

What happens when an APS LCE Language Specialist and a High School Teaching & Learning Coach move beyond parallel work and become true processing partners? This session highlights how one APS high school leveraged that partnership to transform data talks, 90-Day Plan writing, and instructional decision-making in service of bi-multilingual students. Grounded in the WIDA 2020 ELD Framework, the Marco DALE framework, and a biliteracy lens, we share how data-embedded ELD and intentional biliteracy development were integrated into site-based coaching cycles and collaborative data talks. Participants will examine how longitudinal analysis of EL student data across the APS system informed targeted supports, program design, and instructional planning. Learn how protected collaboration time, shared inquiry, and aligned systems work can dismantle silos, strengthen equity-driven practices, and center students’ linguistic and cultural assets in meaningful, sustainable ways.

This interactive session introduces the ECHO model as a powerful, collaborative approach to strengthening literacy and numeracy instruction by highlighting practical and evidence-based strategies being implemented in elementary classrooms. Participants will receive a brief overview of how ECHO supports educator learning through a community of practice with case-based discussion, shared expertise, and real-time problem solving. Participants will engage in structured discussions to reflect on their own practices, share successes and challenges, and learn from peers across the district. This session emphasizes vulnerability, collaboration, and actionable strategies educators can immediately apply in their classrooms. ECHO provides implementation support through low dose, high frequency, virtual profession learning opportunities that are free for educators to attend.

How do we move from “going outside” to meaningful student inquiry and problem-solving? This interactive session focuses on using outdoor learning to deepen thinking through questioning, investigation, and sensemaking. Participants will engage in a guided inquiry experience using real-world cultural and environmental phenomena, including examples from Petroglyph National Monument, co-facilitated with educator Ben Holt, and engineering-based wildlife conservation challenges inspired by Asombro Institute for Science Education. Teachers will explore strategies that support students in moving from noticing to wondering to investigations, and ultimately to designing solutions to real-world problems. Participants will leave with practical tools to design inquiry-driven and problem-based lessons that support critical thinking, student voice, and inclusive practices across content areas.

Participants will learn everything they need for effective implementation of IXL in their classroom. Participants will walk away with practices for using IXL’s comprehensive curriculum, instructional resources, and first-of-its-kind assessment suite to support daily instruction and personalize learning.