Building a Team of Behavior Analysts in the Public School Setting

A few months ago, a few BCBA's from the Boulder Valley School District reached out to me and offered to share the story of how they are fielding a team of Behavior Analysts in the public school setting.

As someone who has spent a career consulting to public schools, I was instantly sold. I believe that as if this recording, the BVSD employs about 10 BCBA's, and in Session 139, I'm joined by four of them: Kelly Miller, Cosmina Barbat, Stephanie Gregory, and Shelly Roberts.

We were also fortunate enough to be joined by their fearless leader, their Director of Special Education, Joy Larson. Someone who understood the value of developing internal behavior-analytic resources to support the district's students.

In this episode we cover the following:

• How the district decided to invest in the hiring of internally placed behavior analysts.
• How the district BCBA's work collaboratively with professionals in other disciplines.
• How BCBA's support students not just with specialized educational and behavioral needs, but also in mainstream educational settings.
• How working as a public school employee is different than working in an at-home or clinic setting.
• And advice for schools that want to hire their own BCBA's, as well as advice for BCBA's who want to dip their toes into the public school waters.

Lastly, I think the argument for having more Behavior Analysts in school settings speaks for itself. As we discuss in the interview, these amazing BCBA's have contributed to reducing Boulder Valley's out of district placements by 70%!

Here are the links for Session 139:

• The Boulder Valley School District.
• Just in case you're thinking of relocating.
• Well Managed Schools curriculum.
• The Mystery Motivator.
• Questions / comments for these guests? Kelly Miller has agreed to field them. Contact her here.

Session 139 is brought to you with generous support from:

• How-to-ABA. Being a BCBA can be lonely and overwhelming. At howtoaba.com, we help BCBA's feel supported and confident by providing easy to access printables, CEU's and a collaborative community. In the howtoaba.com membership, Shira Karpel and Shayna Gaunt share their best resources from years of practice in the field. Whether you're a beginner or a long time practitioner, you will benefit from both these resources as well as a supportive community. Imagine, having an all-in-one resource to save you time and help your clients, having getting your toughest questions answered, and being part of a collaborative group of professionals to share ideas. Plus, your monthly pro membership includes CEU's! Along with over 1000 ABA professionals, howtoaba.com will help you save time, feel confident and master what you love! For more information, Go to howtoaba.com/joinbxresource. When you join today and use code BOP, you'll receive 10% off a yearly subscription (includes CEU's!).
• The Whoop Strap! I've been wearing the Whoop Strap for just a few weeks and I can't tell you how much I've enjoyed getting quantitative information on all aspects of my health, including sleep analytics, heart rate, along with heart rate variability, calorie burn, exercise intensity, and Whoop's proprietary "strain" score. I could extol this neat device's virtues indefinitely to you, but instead, you can go check it out for yourself. To get your first month free, just click here!