2026 Iowa Adult Education & Literacy Conference

Adult education professionals carry tremendous responsibility as they support learners through some of life's most challenging transitions. In this uplifting keynote, Erin Lee Schneider explores the weight we carry and the wonder we create through our work. Through stories and reflections participants will rediscover the moments of impact, transformation, and hope that make this work so meaningful. Erin will also offer a breakout session, where practical strategies will be shared for navigating the weight when it becomes difficult to carry alone.

Join this interactive workshop designed to help you confidently use CASAS assessments, competencies, and reports to guide instruction and support learners’ work‑readiness and training goals. Together, we’ll walk through practical ways to interpret CASAS tools—such as STEPS and GOALS 2 TE Reports, along with eWORKs, and the Teacher Portal—to better understand learner data, identify instructional needs, and make informed decisions that promote meaningful learner progress.

By the end of this session, participants will be able to:

• Interpret CASAS STEPS and GOALS 2 test results, along with key TOPSpro Enterprise (TE) reports, to identify learner needs, performance patterns, and priority skill areas.
• Connect TE data and CASAS assessment results to competencies, standards, and real‑world tasks to understand what learners are ready to do and where they need targeted support.
• Use CASAS tools to plan and adjust instruction that supports learner progress toward training, employment, and work‑readiness goals.

Many adult education and continuing education programs want to offer workforce certification training but face real barriers to building it: curriculum development takes time, qualified instructors are hard to find, and upfront costs are hard to justify before a program has proven it can fill. In this session, Pearson will walk through a live demonstration of a self-paced certification training platform designed for adult learners pursuing careers in healthcare and IT, showing how the program is structured to build skills and keep learners on track. We'll open the floor for questions and discussion throughout, and close with a brainstorm on how your institution could partner with us to expand workforce pathways and impact more Iowans!

A close look and training for directors on how to track, report, and measure professional development within the ConnectAble system.