The 2024 Shaping Our Appalachian Region Summit kicked off Wednesday, bringing the event back to Pikeville for another celebration. Organizers say this year’s SOAR Summit is bringing back some crowd favorites and adding a few new twists to the agenda. The summit started with the opening of the Eastern Kentucky Experience expo hall at the Appalachian Wireless Arena, highlighting some of the opportunities and ongoing projects throughout the region. With businesses, organizations, schools, and other agencies represented on the arena floor, more than 30 sessions have been planned during the next few days, and more than 500 students are seeing the SOAR mission first-hand. SOAR Chief Operating Officer Joshua Ball said it was a good way to start a summit. You can see a full schedule for the SOAR Summit here.