Indiana Early College Summit 2026

This session is ideal for school administrators and counselors beginning their Early College journey or those navigating significant staffing changes within an existing program. Three years ago, our school experienced a major administrative turnover and lost program support staff due to budget cuts. These challenges necessitated the creation of new, more efficient systems for recruitment, applications, program entrance, and academic advising. By streamlining student support, learn how our school now utilizes a smaller staff to provide consistent, routine advising throughout the program. During the session, we'll share these refined systems for recruitment, application, and Early College academic advising.

This presentation focuses on recent research on dual enrollment and Early College, highlighting findings relative to:
1) The relationship of course delivery modality to student outcomes
2) The extent to which college credits earned in high school (AP and dual enrollment) transfer to four-year institutions
3) Implementation of dual enrollment in rural settings in three states (AL, NC, and TN).
Participants will have the opportunity to have their questions about dual enrollment answered.

Join the presenters as they share a multi-layered approach to Indiana's College GO! Week, highlighting a month-long series of advisory lessons for students in grades 9–12. Discover strategies to foster staff-student relationships and build school-wide engagement through activities like "Find the Alum" and "A-Z College Terms" scavenger hunts. Develop and walk away with a theme for your school’s 2026 College GO! week programming.

This session will explore how one Early College program has built a strong college- and career-going culture through intentional programming, strategic partnerships, and student-centered supports. Rather than focusing on individual events, this workshop will emphasize the systems, structures, and mindsets that guide effective early college programming and ensure students are consistently exposed to postsecondary opportunities.

Participants will learn how coordinated programming throughout the school year can support key milestones such as postsecondary exploration, decision-making, and financial aid completion. The session will also highlight the value of engaging alumni, families, and community partners to provide students with relevant perspectives and meaningful support. In addition, attendees will hear how collaboration with postsecondary institutions can expand access to resources, advising, and wraparound services for early college students.

Campus libraries are key elements of the collegiate experience, and high school libraries should be the same for Early College high schools. This session explores what role a school librarian can offer to the college-going culture of a dual credit program. College librarians provide a lot of resources for curriculum planning for instructors and research assistance to students. High school librarians can provide these same services and others. This session familiarizes dual credit staff with how school librarians can help support research and writing skills, online LMS and registration, curriculum and syllabi development, and connection with partner universities. The presenters will provide examples of student and teaching success from an endorsed, learning-focused Early College high school.

Paper forms and spreadsheet tracking shouldn't be what stands between your students and meaningful work-based learning experiences. Join Lori Williamson of Laville Public Schools and Terry Bybee of Flow Forms as they showcase a purpose-built WBL tracking system featuring automatic deadlines, digital approvals, and centralized record-keeping, all designed to save counselors time and keep programs running smoothly.

Positive relationships play a critical role in driving strong outcomes for students. Presenters will share how they set high expectations for Early College students while building the support needed to meet them. When the work becomes challenging, those relationships help students stay engaged, seek support, and succeed academically.

After almost a decade of our Early College Academy, we wanted to do more. We wanted, more than anything, for students within the academy to feel they genuinely had autonomy in the visioning and decision-making. Enter the Early College Leadership Council. In it's second year, sophomores through seniors apply for these positions to be the face and voice of Penn's Early College, and they've already made it better than ever before, organizing everything from service projects to better social media presence, to middle school meet-ups with the incoming Early College class. Here from the sponsor and select students to find out how you could do the same - and it would be more than worth it!

The Rigor Roadmap focuses on intentionally training dual credit students to adopt college-level habits through metacognition and ownership. This session explores structural strategies—such as syllabus deep-dives and comparative expectation modeling—alongside instructional techniques like assignment scaffolding and active reading strategies. Participants will learn how to reinforce rigor through frequent, specific feedback and student conferences, ultimately creating a classroom culture where students take the lead in higher-order thinking and engagement.