Becoming A Board Certified Behavior Analyst At Genesee Health System

I am committed to working with all persons of diverse backgrounds, disabilities and other special needs. Every student should have the experience and ability of working with quality and caring teachers who care enough to take the time to make sure that they are given the tools they need to succeed. My life experiences have shown me how to be a better person and teacher for my students.

Thank you for your considering my application to the Applied Behavior analysis program. For all of my life I have known that I was going to help people. It could be said that it is in my DNA. I just never suspected what the capacity would be. On December 15thI graduated from Albright college, I began working at Melmark on December 16th. My first thought, on that first day was “Oh no, I can’t do this, I need to quit” That was over two years ago, and I have gone to work every day, with a smile on my face. While working at my first position, out of college, I discovered my passion. My passion, I find, is working with children and adults with autism and with people who suffer from addiction. Watching the smiles on their faces, the determination when they work to complete a goal, and just the progress makes every hardship worth it, I love it. Each day, in my position as an ABA, I run behavior support plans, IEPs, teaching plans and other protocols, and each day I truly wish that I could have contributed to these plans, protocols, and IEPs. I ponder the recommendations that I could come up with, I wonder that if I had been able to participate in these conversations to create these plans could I have brought something else to the table, a different viewpoint. Affecting the way that the plans are written and in turn ran, I feel that I could make a big difference in the lives of the children and their families also. Every two weeks each child’s team meets to discuss his or her

I have been a teacher of students with special needs for the last couple of years in alternative settings. The students I like best tend to be the most challenging both behaviorally and academically. Success can be more apparent, yet at times there is frustration. I feel I am good at it, but need to learn more. Most importantly I love teaching kids with special challenges. The key is to be creative and keep trying.

I have a very strong interest in obtaining the Behavioral Technician position at Exceptional Student Education Center. I am currently completing my Master’s in Psychology specializing in Applied Behavioral Analysis. My background experience consists of working with children as well as teens with challenging behaviors in educational, residential and high facility settings. I offer a diverse background with the ability to engage individuals and build positive rapports with youth.

My personal philosophy of special education drives not from teaching in the field, but from, observations, and personal experience, and the workshops I attended. I have had the opportunity to work with individuals with special needs in many different settings, all this help cultivate my knowledge in handling the needs of the special needed student. Special needs students have the ability to learn, to function, to grow, and most importantly to succeed. The difference comes into how they learn or how they need to be taught. There are as many beliefs about the "hows" as there are teachers and each of us forms our own philosophy through our experiences and research. As a student in a special education teachers’ program, learners with

Being a parent to special needs student can be the most difficult challenge a parent can face. Being able to find the necessary support comes with frustration and struggles when

Children with special needs are welcomed by the community. Special needs children are integrated in the same classrooms as other children, giving them the sense of normality. Various learning centers throughout Weslaco provide preschool children with

If you are supporting a child with learning difficulties, it is likely that you would have advice and guidelines from other professionals as to how to manage their needs while encouraging their development. They should be encouraged to develop in all areas to the best of their ability and as much as they can.

The Behavior Analyst Certification Board, Inc. (BACB) has adopted ten guidelines for professional conduct for behavior analyst. Guideline four discusses, The Behavior Analyst and the Individual Behavior Change Program. The guideline states, “The behavior analyst (a) designs programs that are based on behavior analytic principles, including assessments of effects of other intervention methods, (b) involves the client or the client-surrogate in the planning of such programs, (c) obtains the consent of the client, and (d) respects the right of the client to terminate services at any time.” Within guideline four, Least Restrictive Procedures 4.10 dictates, “The behavior analyst reviews and appraises the restrictiveness of alternative interventions and always recommends the least restrictive procedures likely to be effective in dealing with a behavior problem” (Bailey & Burch, 2011.) Based on our ethical guidelines as future behavior analyst we must guarantee our clients interventions are the least restrictive. Promoting least restrictive interventions in school settings ensures the utilization of antecedent manipulations. Utilizing antecedent manipulations may assist with deescalating or preventing further maladaptive behavior. Preventing maladaptive behavior decreases the risks of potential negative side effects such as emotional responding. Employing our ethical guidelines ensures the dignity of our students and promotes student independence.

Becoming an Occupational Therapy Assistant has been one of my big ambitions for years now. I have worked hard to make sure that this is what I wanted to do with my life. I have a passion to help people. I am a very family and church-oriented person. I have been on many mission trips, such as going to Haiti and even more near by Show-Me Youth Home, in Barnett, Missouri, and to see what I could do with this degree is exciting!

Hence, this being another reason why I would like to be considered for the role. It would allow me to work in a similar environment and one that I know I am comfortable and happy in My feelings were confirmed when I attended Lynden day care centre for work experience. I found being with people with learning difficulties fun, engaging and rewarding. The activities ranged from being pro active in an art class to helping others play pool. I made quite a few friends!

Working with children with disabilities can be more challenging than working with other children. There are many important things you need to know and be able to do in order to successfully work with children with disabilities. You need to have certain characteristics that benefit both you and the child, knowing what disability you are working with, and learning how to effectively communicate with children and how to teach them. It is very important to learn what characteristics are important to have when working with a disabled child. Being patient is important because it may take them longer to understand a topic or complete a task.

From the first day a child is born, parents are there to nurture their child, to support them as they grow and develop. There is a lot to learn about raising a child under normal circumstances, but when a child has special needs parents must learn this whole new language of medical and special education terms (Overton, 2005). Parents enter this new world where navigating for the best interest of their child is riddled with challenges and obstacles that they need to somehow overcome. This is especially true when parents are dealing with the special education program in their child’s school.

As a Paraprofessional I have worked with many Special education populations. The most perplexing however was working with students diagnosed with Emotional behavior disturbances. The teacher that I supported has little training in dealing with students with this diagnosis. The level of frustration was always at a maximum. The teacher explained to me that he had just been thrown into the unit and had never had any formal introduction or training in dealing with this

Taking care of children with disabilities requires a compassionate spirit of valuing them as human being worth of respect regardless of their disabilities.