Elementary Principals ConventionOctober 1-3, 2025 | La Crosse Convention Center Cost of Registration:Pre-Con Sessions: $99 or $49 Convention Site:La Crosse Center Hotel Accommodations:
Schedule of EventsWednesday | October 1, 202511:30-5:30 PM Pre-Convention Registration 12:30-4:00 PM Pre-Convention Sessions ($99) 1. Elementary Principals Legal Seminar: What to Do When Social Media Comes to School & Legal Updates All Elementary Principals Need to Know Effective leadership at the elementary level requires that principals understand legal basics as well as staying up to date on legal developments. In addition, principals need to understand how to navigate social media posts that make their way to school. This three-hour presentation will address the legal and practical implications of adult social media posts that make their way to school. Then, we'll dig into legal topics elementary principals need to understand, including custodial rights of parents and seclusion and restraint. Finally, this session will identify important hot topics of the day. The presenters will come prepared with case studies to challenge group thinking and will be ready for questions as they lead a lively group discussion! 2. Today’s Most Powerful Technology Tools for Elementary Leaders This session is designed to equip elementary principals with practical technology skills to enhance their efficiency and leverage the power of artificial intelligence in administrative tasks. Participants will learn to streamline their online workflows using recent updates within Google Chrome and Drive and explore how AI tools can act as virtual assistants to save valuable time. Participants will be given time to apply their learning with tools found in the Google Workspace as well as AI models like Gemini, Brisk Teaching, and more. 2:00-4:00pm Pre-Convention Session ($49) 3. Planning for Your Retirement
Joel Craven, Owner, Astraios Financial LLC This session will provide information on the three legs of a solid retirement: the WI Retirement System, Social Security and personal savings (e.g. Roth, 403(b) plans, etc.). The session will also cover what educators should know about putting savings to good use and public service loan forgiveness. Come with your questions and leave better prepared for your future.
5:00-7:00 PM Welcome Reception Thursday | October 2, 20257:00 AM Registration and Continental Breakfast 7:30-8:15 AM New Principal’s Breakfast If you are a new elementary principal please come to this informal breakfast to meet AWSA staff and other new and 8:30 AM Welcome & Opening Keynote
9:45-10:15 AM Break and Opening of Expo Hall 10:15-11:30 AM Concurrent Session Round One 1. The One-Minute Meeting: Creating Student Stakeholders in Schools
Mary Hemphill, Keynote Speaker This interactive session is tailored for school leaders navigating the demands of today’s evolving educational landscape. At its core is The One-Minute Meeting, a proven framework that empowers leaders to connect meaningfully with every student and staff member, driving engagement and success in a skill-based economy. By dedicating just one minute to each individual and asking three transformational questions, leaders gain authentic insights that shape instructional practices, create inclusive learning environments, and elevate student and teacher outcomes. 2. Each and Every Student, Everyday: Create a Culture that Students Want to Learn In, Staff Want to Work In, and Families Want to be a Part Of “Every day that we walk into our school, we are entrusted with the responsibility and gift of making a difference in our students’ lives. We must be prepared to face challenges, accept failures, honor successes, and take time to recognize that no single success or misstep is a final destination.” Let's delve into the four components and practical strategies presented in the book Culturize by Jimmy Casas to create culture that not only foster academic excellence but also ensures students are eager to learn, staff are motivated to work, and families feel an integral part of the educational journey. 3. The Full Story: Using Feedback Tools Leaders are pretty clear about the impact of feedback on teacher performance but there are many ways that school leaders can and should solicit and use feedback to gauge school climate, the impact of professional development, coaching entry points, etc. This fast-paced session will provide a variety of tools for school leaders to review and identify for use. 4. Tools and Tips for Communicating in Turbulent Times To say that we are living through a time of great change and political turbulence is an understatement. Despite the challenges of our time, we all know that effectively engaging students, staff, parents, and other stakeholders is vital for principals. How do we meaningfully create two-way conversations with our audiences that lead to authentic engagement and build trust? In this session on a timeless topic reprised from last year upon request, former teacher and administrator Brian Nicol will introduce a process and set of tools to thoughtfully engage all stakeholders. Participants are encouraged to bring their communications issues and questions to the session. 5. Continuous Improvement Cycles: From Vicious to Virtuous School leaders will explore why most continuous improvement efforts fail to generate lasting impact, often getting stuck in a vicious Plan-Do loop. This repetitive cycle leads to initiative fatigue, erodes staff culture, and stalls student outcomes. Leaders will learn how to transform this pattern into a virtuous improvement cycle by fully embracing the Plan-Do-Study-Act (PDSA) process. Through real-world examples, reflective discussions, and practical tools, school leaders will leave with a clearer understanding of how to escape the Plan-Do rut and cultivate a data-driven culture of sustainable improvement. 11:30-12:30 PM Luncheon and Elementary Principal of the Year Award 12:30-1:00 PM Dessert with Exhibitors 1:00-2:15 PM Concurrent Session Round Two 1. Preventing the SILOs - Leading for Collaborative Continuous Improvement and Conscious Practice High-performing collaborative teams have a significant impact on both the culture and the outcomes of a school. Silos in schools can lead to misaligned priorities, low morale, and disjointed decision-making. Paying attention to growing and/or perceived silos is a challenging role for any school leader. This session will focus on how to lead a building culture that embraces singletons, challenges historic rhetoric about use of time, and supports continuous improvement and collective efficacy. 2. Keep It Simple – Systems, People, and Planning This session highlights the New Glarus School District’s strategic focus on building and refining key support systems to enhance student success and educator effectiveness.
By prioritizing systems, professional growth, and strategic planning, New Glarus aims to maintain an effective and supportive educational environment.
3. You as a Learning Leader: Transforming Your School Through Data-Informed Improvement Cycles
Joe Schroeder, Associate Executive Director, AWSA The work of a school administrator inherently focuses on the urgent and will remain that way unless one learns how to intentionally disrupt it. Short cycles of data-focused analysis and reflection can empower school leaders to create meaningful and sustainable change. In this session, you’ll explore strategies to effectively design and implement data-informed improvement cycles that prioritize what matters most for your school community. Leave with actionable tools that are informed by Wisconsin school examples to lead with clarity and purpose for more impact, even amidst the demands of daily operations. 4. AI-Powered Collaboration: Accelerating the Impact of School Teams
Yari Rodriguez, Director of Urban Leadership, AWSA School leaders will learn how to accelerate the effectiveness and impact of their collaborative teams by integrating AI tools and adopting a laser-sharp focus on student outcomes. Too often, team meetings focus on surface-level discussions or broad instructional practices, resulting in minimal impact on student growth. This session will introduce a practical framework where teams:
Through interactive discussions, practical examples, and AI demonstrations, participants will leave equipped with a streamlined process and AI-powered tools to transform collaborative teams into high-impact, results-driven forces for student success. 5. The Strength of the Wolf is in the Pack - Our School Journey
Kyle Moore, Principal, Wilson Elementary School, Sheboygan School District At Wilson, every student is part of the Wolfpack—a school-wide initiative designed to deliver individualized instruction, intervention, and enrichment. In this session, learn how Wilson Elementary has structured a daily Wolfpack period where students set personalized goals and receive targeted support to meet and exceed grade-level essential standards. Through strategic grouping, maximized staffing, and a collaborative approach, the Wolfpack model fosters increased student achievement, personalized learning, and a schoolwide learning culture. Walk away with practical strategies to implement a similar framework in your school and empower all students to reach their full potential.
6. Hitting the Ground Running: How to Serve as an Instructional Leader while Building Relationships your First Year in a Building
Christie Johnson, Principal, Horizon Elementary School, Pewaukee School District As a new leader to the district and building, a huge part of our focus is around building relationships. At the same time, building a culture around instructional leadership is important. In this session, I will share how I built relationships and implemented small yet meaningful changes that impacted instruction. These changes involve systems and structures for coaching, PLCs, and professional learning. 2:15-2:30 PM Break with Exhibitors 2:30-3:45 PM Concurrent Sessions Round Three 1. Empowering Educators: Creating a Culture of Highly Engaged Employees Highly engaged educators are the foundation of successful schools. Research shows that engaged teachers are more committed to student learning, foster stronger relationships, and contribute to a more positive school environment. In this session, participants will gain valuable insights into how the Kaukauna Area School District has successfully leveraged the Gallup Q12 survey to measure and improve staff engagement. Through a strategic and intentional approach, the district has seen an increase in staff engagement, retention, and student achievement. Attendees will hear directly from principals about how they utilize Q12 data to create actionable plans that foster a positive and productive school culture. This interactive session will include a combination of data-driven insights, firsthand experiences from school leaders, and practical takeaways for participants to implement in their own districts. 2. Leading Literacy Roundtable This roundtable will allow participants to share practical information with one another on priority issues related to implementing Act 20 and our ongoing efforts to improve literacy practices. From overcoming assessment overload to adjusting testing windows to improving literacy practices, come learn and share with your colleagues. Priority subjects will be selected by surveying participants before the Convention. 3. Leading Through “Third Things” – Coaching Instead of Commanding How does a leader manage the power dynamic inherent in organizations to create conditions that bring out the best in others, individually and collectively? Explore how “third things” can transform your leadership approach, where you increasingly guide staff members and teams as a coach, rather than as a top-down supervisor. This session will share a host of potential third thing tools and means for integrating them that school leaders across Wisconsin have found helpful to create safe spaces for dialogue, foster deeper connections, and inspire authentic self-reflection Leave equipped with strategies to shift from a traditional boss role to more of a coaching stance, which cultivates trust, growth, and shared commitments while also inspiring relevant, actionable next steps in self and others. 4. Conversations that Lead to Conscious Practice We certainly want our conversations with educators to be impactful. We want our feedback to be validating and actionable. And we make assumptions that most of our conversations do this. This session is devoted to coaching practice, something most leaders don’t get to do very often, but recognize how important it is to evaluate our own impact. In this session, participants will spend the time practicing conversations with peers in a safe, learning-focused environment using scenario prompts. 5. Leading by Listening Effective leadership begins with the ability to truly listen. Drawing from Born for Love by Maia Szalavitz and Bruce Perry, this session explores the science behind empathy and how it plays a pivotal role in building strong, supportive school communities. Participants will engage in practical exercises centered on empathy interviews, using a structured protocol to actively listen and respond to their colleagues’ experiences. These exercises will deepen understanding of how empathetic listening can foster trust, improve communication, and enhance school culture. By practicing these skills, principals will leave with a stronger ability to connect with their staff, students, and communities, ultimately leading to more compassionate and effective leadership.
4:30-6:30 PM Reception Friday | October 3, 20257:00-8:00 AM Fellowship Breakfast (Optional) School administrators support the boundless needs of those they lead and serve. But who supports them -- especially in ways tending to the heart and spirit? Join AWSA’s Associate Executive Director, Joe Schroeder, and administrative colleagues from across the state in this Christian fellowship breakfast option that, now in its ninth year, is proving for many to be an annual highlight of encouragement and assistance for the next leg of the leadership and life journey. (Please note: we will adjourn the fellowship breakfast in time to attend the Breakfast Program in full that will follow this breakfast next door.) 8:00-8:50 AM BREAKFAST PROGRAM: Investing in Principal Excellence: Our Commitments, Current Realities, and Next Steps For over a decade, AWSA has been building an array of team-centered and individual leadership academies and networks, often with coaching support, to build high-impact learning leaders across Wisconsin. This session is designed to provide an update about the impact of these efforts to date amid a host of challenges and barriers. Before concluding, we seek your individual and collective input regarding current realities and next steps regarding AWSA's professional learning, which members have consistently communicated is, by far, the most important of supports needed. 9:00-10:15 AM Concurrent Sessions Round Four 1. The Impact of 30 Second Moments 960. That is the number of 30 second increments we get in an 8 hour day. 960 chances to change a life. 960 opportunities to share a story. 960 times to make a student, parent, or community member feel like they are part of your school. Moments have the ability to stick in our brain forever. A sight, smell, or taste brings us back to our childhood. We have a responsibility to be intentional about how we utilize these moments. The fact is simply this...you will be remembered, the only question is how. Every 30 seconds matter. 2. Energy Leadership: Keeping Educators Motivated in a Challenging Socio-Political Climate What does it take to keep educators motivated when every corner of their world and life may present obstacles and perceived barriers to student impact? This session will focus on leading a school community that energizes one another, sees change as an opportunity, and focuses on thriving, not just surviving. 3. Creating a Positive School Climate: Building Powerful Teams for Tier 2 Behavior Support This session is tailored for principals seeking effective strategies to address Tier 2 behaviors through a culturally responsive lens. By fostering inclusive problem-solving approaches, educators can create supportive environments that empower both students and staff. Join us as we explore practical techniques for forming powerful teams dedicated to supporting student and educator success. Through examples, case studies, and discussions, participants will gain insights into reducing disciplinary incidents and the need for intensive supports. 4. Legislative Update Dee Pettack will provide an overview of the Legislative issues of most importance to elementary school leaders. 10:15-10:30 AM Break
10:30 AM Closing Keynote
Vendor Information
Tabletop fee is $420 and includes: 1 8’ table, 2 chairs, lunch, dessert break, pre-registrants list one week prior to the event. If you are a vendor who has questions about the event or would like to be put on the distribution list for 2025 please contact Katie Lowe. Each year AWSA's Elementary Principals Convention brings in hundreds of administrators from across the state of Wisconsin. Vendors will have the opportunity to engage in unique face-to-face interactions throughout the convention. Event Cancellation or Postponement Conventions, Conferences, and Workshop Cancellation Policy Dietary Disclaimer Accessibility *Refund fees retained by AWSA pay for your food guarantees, a/v equipment, meeting room rental and any hotel attritions caused by the cancellation. |
Creating a Culture of Yes