ACTE Postsecondary CTE Summit 2026

For years, career-technical education has operated under the assumption that hands-on, skilled work is largely protected from AI disruption. That assumption is changing—and changing faster than many CTE educators may realize. In this interactive micro workshop, participants will take a closer look at what AI may mean for their fields, programs, and students, while exploring both the challenges and opportunities that come with these changes.
Participants will then apply two practical frameworks they can use in their own teaching and course design:

1. Question → Generate → Critique → Refine: A metacognitive process that helps students—and instructors—think deliberately about how they learn, reason, and use AI. Participants will explore where and when AI can appropriately fit within this process.
2. Human-Only → Human-First + AI Verification → AI-as-Critique-Target: A decision-making framework for determining how AI should—or should not—be incorporated into a learning activity or assessment based on the task's stakes, verifiability, and nature.

What You'll Do
This is a hands-on, discussion-driven session. Participants will work in intentionally mixed groups, engaging with colleagues from both similar and very different CTE disciplines. Through structured discussion and application activities, participants will:

• Examine and challenge assumptions about how AI may affect their own CTE field.
• Apply the Question → Generate → Critique → Refine process to a real learning or teaching context.
• Use the Human-Only / Human-First / AI-as-Critique-Target framework to examine an existing course activity or assessment.
• Stress-test their thinking by hearing perspectives from colleagues in other disciplines.
• Identify one concrete opportunity to apply what they learned when they return to their institution.

What You'll Leave With
By the end of the session, participants will have:

• A clearer perspective on how AI may affect their specific CTE field.
• A practical framework for evaluating where AI belongs in learning activities and assessment.
• A self-assessment of their current course design through an AI-informed lens.
• One concrete next step they can take back to their institution and continue developing.