Association of Washington Business’ Post

Entrepreneurs and small business owners have until Monday to pitch their product to Walmart in the annual Open Call! Open Call offers an extraordinary growth opportunity for small and medium businesses. Entrepreneurs who secure a "golden ticket" — a deal for Walmart to sell their products in stores or online — can gain access to a vast customer base, enabling significant growth. After earning golden tickets, Open Call winners often go on to grow their manufacturing footprints and create jobs within their local communities.

🇺🇲 Civic participation is at the heart of America’s self-governance. On this Independence Day, we celebrate remarkable civic knowledge in the next generation of Americans, as we saw amply demonstrated at the Washington championship of the National Civics Bee competition held last weekend in Olympia. Read more: https://lnkd.in/gSrTttKS

Huge congratulations to Ilyannie Gonzalez, the 2024 National Civics Bee Washington state champion, to our runners-up, Benjamin Wu and Athena Strickler, and to all 13 students from across Washington who competed in the state finals in Olympia on Saturday! These middle school students wrote thoughtful essays on how they would solve a problem in their community, answered a variety of challenging quiz bowl questions on American government and history, and then five finalists delivered a speech and answered questions posed by a trio of judges. Ilyannie, a seventh-grader from Port Orchard, will travel to Washington, D.C., in November to compete in the first-ever National Civics Bee championship, held by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce Foundation. Washington state will be well-represented! We appreciate our judges for their service: Paul Francis of the Washington State Board for Community and Technical Colleges; Renee Radlcliff Sinclair of TVW Washington's Public Affairs Network and Chris Reykdal of the Office of Superintendent of Public Instruction. We also are grateful for our co-presenting sponsors, BECU and Delta Air Lines. Read more about our winners and the competition: https://lnkd.in/gqmgm8Jd

Wow! We are still abuzz from today's Washington state championship of the National Civics Bee competition. Thirteen remarkable middle-schoolers from every corner of Washington were deeply impressive and inspiring as they demonstrated civic knowledge about their country and their visions to improve their communities. Check back in the days to come for more on the winners. With young people like this in Washington, the future is bright! Big thanks to our emcee, Lt. Gov. Denny Heck, and to our three distinguished judges: Paul Francis of the State Board for Community and Technical Colleges, Renee Radcliff Sinclair of TVW, and Chris Reykdal of the Office of the Superintendent of Public Instruction. And thanks to our co-presenting sponsors, Delta Air Lines and BECU.

We had a fabulous last day of our Canada trade mission in Ottawa discussing the United States-Mexico-Canada agreement, AI governance in Canada, access to Canada's market for Washington's producers, and more. The day wrapped with a beautiful reception at the residence of the U.S. Ambassador to Canada. Thank you to everyone who participated in the trade mission to strengthen economic ties with Washington's top trading partner.

Check out the stacked agenda. Don't miss this...

😎 Tough day at the office! Day two of AWB’s Canada trade mission started with a morning boat ride of Canada's busiest port hosted by the Vancouver Fraser Port Authority. It ended with a horse-drawn carriage ride around beautiful Stanley Park. The day also included important discussions on energy innovation and solving housing shortages in B.C. and Washington. And it wouldn’t be an AWB trade mission without a visit to the local Costco Wholesale to look at the many Washington goods for sale from Walla Walla sweet onions and cherries to coffee. Big thanks to Amazon for hosting and showing off its newest Vancouver office, which is housed in a former Canada Post facility. Tomorrow the delegation is off to Ottawa for the second part of the trade mission.