Congratulations to all of the recent high school and college graduates – and the school professionals who supported them along the way! It was a full and exciting school year for all of our Compass schools, students, and employers.
We are keeping that energy up throughout the summer at Golden Path, as we use this time to update and fine-tune Compass, refresh guides and resources, create new Career Profiles, and improve processes. We’re building more partnerships and growing our community – all to help create more connections and support for all of you.
Keep reading for the latest news!
Beyond the classroom: How the NDDOT is expanding the impact of Career Profiles
What started as a way to highlight careers at the North Dakota Department of Transportation (NDDOT) has evolved into a powerful tool for recruitment, career exploration, and employee development – reaching everyone from middle school students to seasoned professionals.
Taking full advantage of its Golden Path Awareness Membership with unlimited employer-written Career Profiles in Compass, the NDDOT currently highlights 24 profiles covering everything from heavy equipment operator to chemist, archaeologist, pilot, and civil rights director. Each profile features detailed career descriptions, helpful links, related resources, photos, and often a video.
The Career Profiles are easily accessible by middle school and high school students in Compass, but the NDDOT didn’t stop there. Thanks to the open URL feature, the department is widely sharing the profiles beyond the classroom – on websites and socials, with college students, and even with its own employees.
“We can update all of our career information in one spot,” says NDDOT Talent Acquisition Manager Lynn Spomer. “We put everything we want in there, including photos, videos, and all of our state links. We can teach young students about what we do, but we can also show adults as well. We really use the Career Profiles for everything.”
Read the blog post to learn how the NDDOT is leveraging its Career Profiles in exciting ways.
How AI is helping employers save time and reach more students in Compass
Golden Path is strategically using AI to make Compass even easier for employers. From a new employer quick setup process (including an option for school professionals to create their own employer QR Code invites) to leveraging AI for Career Profiles, we’re streamlining processes so employers can connect with students more efficiently and effectively.
In both cases, we’re using AI to support and strengthen employers’ work in Compass, not to replace the personal insight and authenticity only their organization can provide. Their voices, experiences, and stories are what help students build trust, connect with companies, and better understand their careers and opportunities.
Read the blog post for details on how we’re using AI to help employers in Compass.
Welcoming new employer members in Compass
The Golden Path community welcomes our first employer memberships via our partnership with the Fargo Moorhead West Fargo Chamber of Commerce. Kava Construction in Fargo joined as a Connections Member and Metropolitan Mechanical Contractors in Eden Prairie, MN, joined as a Premium Member. FMWF Chamber members receive preferred pricing on our memberships. Contact us for more information.
Creedence Energy Services in Minot recently renewed its Awareness Membership. In addition, several companies recently joined with new Basic Memberships, including Progressive Care Therapy in Detroit Lakes, MN; Kelly Services in Fargo; Machinewell, Inc., in Grygla, MN; and Charras and Tequila in Grand Forks, ND.
Watch for new Career Profiles this summer!
Connecting at upcoming events
We can’t wait to connect with many of you at a variety of upcoming events. Golden Path Solutions will be attending, hosting a table, or speaking at the following summer and fall events:
- South Dakota CTE Summer Conference July 26-28 in Brookings
- North Dakota CTE Professional Development Conference 3-5 in Bismarck
- North Dakota Society for Human Resource Management (ND SHRM) State Conference 23-25 in Grand Forks
- Minnesota State Career and Technical Education Summit 12-13 in Minneapolis
Be sure to say hi and update us on your school or organization. We’re here to support your career exploration and planning efforts or future workforce development!
Employer memberships renew in August
We’re updating our employer membership terms to align with the school year, Aug. 1 through July 31. As a result, our organizations with expiration dates outside of these dates will be extended and aligned to these new start and end dates. We’ll start sending out renewal notifications in the next few weeks.
We use membership dollars to both improve Compass’ functionality and drive more awareness of employer opportunities in Compass. Recognizing how important ROI is for employers when leveraging systems like Compass, we’ll also provide more insights to employers. That might include the schools teaching the skills or offering the classes that are important to a specific industry or career, sharing student interest trend data, usage data, and more – all for both K-12 and postsecondary schools.
We will also provide recommendations on how employers can improve their footprint within Compass. Stay tuned for more information as we get closer to the 2026-2027 school year.
Summer Compass tips for employers and school professionals
Summer is the perfect time to make a couple of updates in Compass to improve your results and increase your connections. Here are a couple of suggestions:
Employers: You can refresh your employer profile in just a few minutes. Log in to Compass and click on the Pencil icon to edit your profile. Update contact information and links, refresh your bio content if needed, and choose up to 10 careers that you offer at your company. All of this information helps students learn more about you and your careers.
School professionals: Refresh your homepage by reviewing your sections with notifications. Take a moment to review any new Career Profiles and work-based learning experiences, as these could be very helpful to your students next fall.
We recommend also taking a few minutes to look over the new School Professional Compass Guides and Resources to Share with Others pages, available in both standalone Compass and the Professional Center (for North Dakota school professionals). These guides and resources will come in handy this fall.
Contact us with any Compass questions. Watch your email inbox for the bi-monthly Compass Release Notes with the latest features.
NDUS college feedback drives new features for Compass rollout
As a result of our interviews with all 11 North Dakota University System (NDUS) institutions, we’ve identified several new features to add to Compass. We’ll also be tailoring plans and training for each college this summer, so all of the colleges are ready for the 2026-2027 school year.
NDUS received a grant from the Midwest Higher Education Compact (MHEC) to use Compass across the entire system.
After completing interviews with all 11 colleges, we consolidated our findings around the three questions we posed to each of them:
- How are you connecting with potential students today? What’s working and what could be improved?
- How are you supporting your own students in terms of employer connections and experiential learning?
- What could we do to improve collaboration between K-12 and postsecondary?
We’ve also started asking these same questions to the five North Dakota Tribal College System colleges.
Let us know about your events
If you have an event that you want us to include in our newsletter, please send us a note at info@goldenpath.net. If you are an employer and want to publish your event to schools and students, remember that you can do that through Compass. If you’re an educator wanting to invite employers to a school event (like a career fair or expo), you can do that in Compass too, choosing the employers you invite by industry, name, career cluster, or distance from you.
Upcoming events
- July 26-28: South Dakota CTE Summer Conference, Brookings
- July 29-30: TEDxFargo 2026
- Aug. 3-5: North Dakota CTE Professional Development Conference, Bismarck
- Sept. 16-18: North Dakota League of Cities Annual Conference, Grand Forks
- Sept. 22: Greater North Dakota Chamber 2026 Policy Summit, Bismarck
- Sept. 23-25: North Dakota Society for Human Resource Management (ND SHRM) State Conference, Grand Forks
- Oct. 28: Northern Valley Career Expo, Grand Forks
- Nov. 12-13: Minnesota State Career and Technical Education Summit, Minneapolis
Connect with us
Contact us for more information or more opportunities with Golden Path Solutions.