What’s New About The Amplified Planning 2026 Externship
Most financial planning education programs do a solid job of teaching the technical knowledge. The retirement projections, the tax strategies, and the investment frameworks are all there. What they weren’t designed to do is prepare someone for what it actually feels like to sit across from a real client with real complexity, real emotions, and no clean answer waiting at the end of the spreadsheet.
That gap between knowing the material and being able to do the work is what The Amplified Planning Externship was built to close.
The program started in 2020, during the early months of the COVID-19 pandemic, when internships and on-ramps into the profession disappeared almost overnight. We really wanted to help people in this profession, so we ran focus groups and listened to what the financial planning community actually needed. Then… we built something: a virtual externship that gave students and career changers real exposure to the profession when they had nowhere else to get it.
And now we’re kicking off our seventh Externship. How time flies! The Externship has grown significantly since then: more than 6,500 alumni, a constantly evolving curriculum, and a community that continues to grow.
Here’s what it is, what it does, and what’s new this summer.
What The Externship Actually Is
The Externship is an 8-week virtual program that runs June 1st through July 31st every summer. You have until August 31st to complete all materials and earn a Certificate of Completion that earns your 500 CFP Board standard pathway hours — and a right to say you finished The Externship on your resume! The time commitment is approximately 15–20 hours per week, but everything is asynchronous and/or recorded, so you can catch up on your own time.
Each week focuses on a core area of financial planning, with the technology matching the topic:
- Week 1: Onboarding new clients — Technology focus: Redtail
- Week 2: Cash Flow Planning — Technology focus: eMoney
- Week 3: Retirement Planning — Technology focus: eMoney
- Week 4: Investment Planning — Technology focus: Nitrogen (new in 2026)
- Week 5: College Planning — Technology focus: Asset-Map
- Week 6: Insurance Planning — Technology focus: eMoney
- Week 7: Tax Planning — Technology focus: Holistiplan (new in 2026)
- Week 8: Estate Planning — Technology focus: EncorEstate Plans
All content is posted at the beginning of each week. You’ll get access to a REAL client meeting and commentary from Hannah Moore, CFP®, breaking down the meeting. This is where real learning happens, because you can see in real-time what her decision-making process was and what she is doing to navigate the conversation and any challenges that come up.
You’ll also get access to recorded interviews from our weekly experts, sharing their insights into the topic of the week. We’ll also have a technology assignment using one of our 6 amazing technology partners!
Live sessions happen on Wednesdays, Thursdays, and occasionally Fridays. However, attendance is never mandatory. Everything is recorded and posted the following day. Externs have completed the program while working full-time jobs, raising young kids, and taking family vacations. The structure is designed to flex around you, not the other way around.
Live sessions run Wednesday office hours with guest experts at 11am, 1pm, and 3pm CT; a Thursday technology support hour at 11am CT; and Live and Late — a casual Thursday evening gathering of Externs, Hannah, and special guests at 7pm CT. These are all optional, and ALL recorded!
At the end of each week’s recorded content, you’ll have a set of assignments — quizzes, reflections, and assessments to prove you did the work. These lead to your weekly certificates, and you have to collect all 8 to complete the program!
The most important thing to understand about the Externship is this: participants don’t just learn about financial planning. They work through it actively, week by week, with real cases and real tools. That distinction matters more than it might sound. Alumni consistently point to it as what made the program different from everything else they’d done.
Upon completion, participants earn 500 CFP Board standard pathway hours and 180 AFCPE experience hours: meaningful progress toward the CFP and AFC designations for anyone on that path.
What’s New in The 2026 Externship?
Every year, we build on what we’ve learned from the previous cohort. 2026 brings the most significant set of updates since the program launched.
Two Brand New Clients
This summer, Externs will work through two entirely new client scenarios, each designed to reflect the kind of complexity planners actually encounter in practice.
Julia & Ryan are business owners with multiple entities, unique net worth, and cash flow scenarios that don’t fit a standard framework. Their case requires a planner to slow down and understand the full picture before making a single recommendation; this is the kind of thinking that takes time to develop and can’t be rushed.
Tron & Miranda are traveling physical therapists carrying significant student loan debt and a ton of goals for their money. Their situation requires planners to think carefully about how different strategies interact with each other, and how legislation can totally change a financial plan in a matter of weeks. It’s the kind of case where knowing the right answer to one part of the plan can change the right answer to everything else.
Two New Platforms
Nitrogen joins the tech stack during investment planning week. Nitrogen is the profession’s leading risk tolerance platform, and Externs will learn how to assess a client’s Risk Number, generate investment proposals, and have risk conversations that clients can actually understand.
Holistiplan comes in during tax planning week. It uses OCR technology to read a client’s tax return in seconds and surface planning opportunities: Roth conversions, tax-efficient withdrawals, charitable giving strategies, and more. Externs will use it to see how tax planning integrates into the broader financial plan in a way that’s both powerful and client-friendly.
These two platforms join our long-term tech partners: eMoney, Redtail, Asset-Map, and EncorEstate Plans!
A Brand New Learning System
The 2026 Externship launches on a completely rebuilt platform: more dynamic learning experiences designed for how people actually engage with content. This will include a mobile app, so Externs can work through the program wherever they are. This system and website upgrade is going to have a massive impact on an already meaningful experience!
Who The 2026 Externship is For
The Externship was built for anyone who wants more than theory. That includes:
- Students in financial planning programs who want real exposure before they graduate
- Career changers who are serious about entering the profession and want something more substantive than another course
- Early-career planners who want to build competence and confidence faster than on-the-job experience alone allows
- Firms and team leaders who want to invest in their people in a meaningful, structured way
Anyone who simply wants to understand more about how financial planning actually works in practice
If you’re willing to do the work, there’s a place for you here.
What Makes The Externship Worth It
The Externship has always been built around a single belief: real preparation requires real exposure. Seven years and 6,500+ alumni later, that belief hasn’t changed. But the program has grown significantly around it: more clients, more technology, more experts, a stronger community, and now a brand new platform to hold it all.
2026 is the most complete version of the Externship we’ve ever put together. If you’ve been thinking about it, this is the year to stop thinking and register.
Here are just a few things that make The Externship worth it:
Real Client Meetings
Participants watch actual client meetings, not role plays or written reconstructions. This is one of the most consistently cited elements by Alumni as transformative. There’s something irreplaceable about watching how an experienced planner handles real tension, real uncertainty, and a real person sitting across from them. You can read about it, but seeing it is different.
Real Technology
Externs get hands-on access to the platforms that actual planning firms use every day: eMoney, Asset-Map, EncorEstate Plans, Redtail, and new this year, Nitrogen and Holistiplan. All of these platforms are included in your registration, which is only $447 this year!. Learning the tools and using them to do financial planning work makes a real difference when you’re eventually in a firm setting, and the platform is already familiar.
Dozens of Expert Sessions
Each week features three practitioners speaking on that week’s topic — cash flow planning, retirement, tax, estate planning, and more. Beyond the weekly sessions, a series of level-up interviews brings in specialists from across the profession to share their stories, their niches, and their experience. It’s a range of perspectives you’d be hard-pressed to find in one place anywhere else.
Special note: Our Alumni tell us that networking with experts has landed them jobs!
Community
Early registrants get immediate access to the Extern forums, a place to connect with other new and aspiring planners, build relationships, and find community with people who are serious about this work. Externs have found jobs through connections made in the program. They’ve built study groups, book clubs, and professional friendships that lead to jobs and outlast the eight weeks. The network is real, and it grows every year.
Registration is open now.
The program starts June 1st. The cost is $447 per person, with scholarships available for those with financial need. Register at amplifiedplanning.com/externship.
Most financial planning education programs do a solid job of teaching the technical knowledge. The retirement projections, the tax strategies, and the investment frameworks are all there. What they weren’t designed to do is prepare someone for what it actually feels like to sit across from a real client with real complexity, real emotions, and no clean answer waiting at the end of the spreadsheet.
That gap between knowing the material and being able to do the work is what The Amplified Planning Externship was built to close.
The program started in 2020, during the early months of the COVID-19 pandemic, when internships and on-ramps into the profession disappeared almost overnight. We really wanted to help people in this profession, so we ran focus groups and listened to what the financial planning community actually needed. Then… we built something: a virtual externship that gave students and career changers real exposure to the profession when they had nowhere else to get it.
And now we’re kicking off our seventh Externship. How time flies! The Externship has grown significantly since then: more than 6,500 alumni, a constantly evolving curriculum, and a community that continues to grow.
Here’s what it is, what it does, and what’s new this summer.
What The Externship Actually Is
The Externship is an 8-week virtual program that runs June 1st through July 31st every summer. You have until August 31st to complete all materials and earn a Certificate of Completion that earns your 500 CFP Board standard pathway hours — and a right to say you finished The Externship on your resume! The time commitment is approximately 15–20 hours per week, but everything is asynchronous and/or recorded, so you can catch up on your own time.
Each week focuses on a core area of financial planning, with the technology matching the topic:
- Week 1: Onboarding new clients — Technology focus: Redtail
- Week 2: Cash Flow Planning — Technology focus: eMoney
- Week 3: Retirement Planning — Technology focus: eMoney
- Week 4: Investment Planning — Technology focus: Nitrogen (new in 2026)
- Week 5: College Planning — Technology focus: Asset-Map
- Week 6: Insurance Planning — Technology focus: eMoney
- Week 7: Tax Planning — Technology focus: Holistiplan (new in 2026)
- Week 8: Estate Planning — Technology focus: EncorEstate Plans
All content is posted at the beginning of each week. You’ll get access to a REAL client meeting and commentary from Hannah Moore, CFP®, breaking down the meeting. This is where real learning happens, because you can see in real-time what her decision-making process was and what she is doing to navigate the conversation and any challenges that come up.
You’ll also get access to recorded interviews from our weekly experts, sharing their insights into the topic of the week. We’ll also have a technology assignment using one of our 6 amazing technology partners!
Live sessions happen on Wednesdays, Thursdays, and occasionally Fridays. However, attendance is never mandatory. Everything is recorded and posted the following day. Externs have completed the program while working full-time jobs, raising young kids, and taking family vacations. The structure is designed to flex around you, not the other way around.
Live sessions run Wednesday office hours with guest experts at 11am, 1pm, and 3pm CT; a Thursday technology support hour at 11am CT; and Live and Late — a casual Thursday evening gathering of Externs, Hannah, and special guests at 7pm CT. These are all optional, and ALL recorded!
At the end of each week’s recorded content, you’ll have a set of assignments — quizzes, reflections, and assessments to prove you did the work. These lead to your weekly certificates, and you have to collect all 8 to complete the program!
The most important thing to understand about the Externship is this: participants don’t just learn about financial planning. They work through it actively, week by week, with real cases and real tools. That distinction matters more than it might sound. Alumni consistently point to it as what made the program different from everything else they’d done.
Upon completion, participants earn 500 CFP Board standard pathway hours and 180 AFCPE experience hours: meaningful progress toward the CFP and AFC designations for anyone on that path.
What’s New in The 2026 Externship?
Every year, we build on what we’ve learned from the previous cohort. 2026 brings the most significant set of updates since the program launched.
Two Brand New Clients
This summer, Externs will work through two entirely new client scenarios, each designed to reflect the kind of complexity planners actually encounter in practice.
Julia & Ryan are business owners with multiple entities, unique net worth, and cash flow scenarios that don’t fit a standard framework. Their case requires a planner to slow down and understand the full picture before making a single recommendation; this is the kind of thinking that takes time to develop and can’t be rushed.
Tron & Miranda are traveling physical therapists carrying significant student loan debt and a ton of goals for their money. Their situation requires planners to think carefully about how different strategies interact with each other, and how legislation can totally change a financial plan in a matter of weeks. It’s the kind of case where knowing the right answer to one part of the plan can change the right answer to everything else.
Two New Platforms
Nitrogen joins the tech stack during investment planning week. Nitrogen is the profession’s leading risk tolerance platform, and Externs will learn how to assess a client’s Risk Number, generate investment proposals, and have risk conversations that clients can actually understand.
Holistiplan comes in during tax planning week. It uses OCR technology to read a client’s tax return in seconds and surface planning opportunities: Roth conversions, tax-efficient withdrawals, charitable giving strategies, and more. Externs will use it to see how tax planning integrates into the broader financial plan in a way that’s both powerful and client-friendly.
These two platforms join our long-term tech partners: eMoney, Redtail, Asset-Map, and EncorEstate Plans!
A Brand New Learning System
The 2026 Externship launches on a completely rebuilt platform: more dynamic learning experiences designed for how people actually engage with content. This will include a mobile app, so Externs can work through the program wherever they are. This system and website upgrade is going to have a massive impact on an already meaningful experience!
Who The 2026 Externship is For
The Externship was built for anyone who wants more than theory. That includes:
- Students in financial planning programs who want real exposure before they graduate
- Career changers who are serious about entering the profession and want something more substantive than another course
- Early-career planners who want to build competence and confidence faster than on-the-job experience alone allows
- Firms and team leaders who want to invest in their people in a meaningful, structured way
Anyone who simply wants to understand more about how financial planning actually works in practice
If you’re willing to do the work, there’s a place for you here.
What Makes The Externship Worth It
The Externship has always been built around a single belief: real preparation requires real exposure. Seven years and 6,500+ alumni later, that belief hasn’t changed. But the program has grown significantly around it: more clients, more technology, more experts, a stronger community, and now a brand new platform to hold it all.
2026 is the most complete version of the Externship we’ve ever put together. If you’ve been thinking about it, this is the year to stop thinking and register.
Here are just a few things that make The Externship worth it:
Real Client Meetings
Participants watch actual client meetings, not role plays or written reconstructions. This is one of the most consistently cited elements by Alumni as transformative. There’s something irreplaceable about watching how an experienced planner handles real tension, real uncertainty, and a real person sitting across from them. You can read about it, but seeing it is different.
Real Technology
Externs get hands-on access to the platforms that actual planning firms use every day: eMoney, Asset-Map, EncorEstate Plans, Redtail, and new this year, Nitrogen and Holistiplan. All of these platforms are included in your registration, which is only $447 this year!. Learning the tools and using them to do financial planning work makes a real difference when you’re eventually in a firm setting, and the platform is already familiar.
Dozens of Expert Sessions
Each week features three practitioners speaking on that week’s topic — cash flow planning, retirement, tax, estate planning, and more. Beyond the weekly sessions, a series of level-up interviews brings in specialists from across the profession to share their stories, their niches, and their experience. It’s a range of perspectives you’d be hard-pressed to find in one place anywhere else.
Special note: Our Alumni tell us that networking with experts has landed them jobs!
Community
Early registrants get immediate access to the Extern forums, a place to connect with other new and aspiring planners, build relationships, and find community with people who are serious about this work. Externs have found jobs through connections made in the program. They’ve built study groups, book clubs, and professional friendships that lead to jobs and outlast the eight weeks. The network is real, and it grows every year.
Registration is open now.
The program starts June 1st. The cost is $447 per person, with scholarships available for those with financial need. Register at amplifiedplanning.com/externship.
