School-based behavior analysts routinely work alongside and provide oversight to professionals whose primary training sits outside behavior analysis — special educators, paraeducators, school psychologists, and speech-language pathologists, among others. When a BCBA provides supervision in this context, they are entering a professional environment with its own evaluation traditions, accountability structures, and institutional norms that may differ substantially from the behavioral framework they were trained in.
Provider: BehaviorLive — via KHY ABA
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Join Free →Supervising professionals trained outside of the field of behavior analysis is a common experience for many school-based behavior analysts. However, the educator evaluation mechanism common to public schools is drastically different in functionality from supervision as referred to by behavior analysts. This tension between fields has led to riffs between these complementary areas of expertise and can be alleviated by expanding BCBA practice areas into familiarity with other fields. This session will begin exploring the common competing contingencies between federally mandated public educator evaluation systems and the behavior analyst's ethical responsibility to supervisees. A series of common educator evaluation tools will be brought forward, both in alignment with ethical supervision practices, as well as outside of the traditional foundation of BCBA knowledge and skills. Room for professional reflection on identified scopes of competence will be provided at the end of the session with resources to engage in behaviorally analytic activities endeared by school-based professionals.
| Certification Body | Credits | Type |
|---|---|---|
| BACB® | 1 | Supervision |
Heather Volchko is a school-based consultant, behavior analyst, and program evaluator specializing in emotional and behavioral disorders, trauma-informed behavior analysis, organizational behavior management, and leadership psychology. She has been a coordinator, teacher, and paraprofessional in therapeutic, alternative, self-contained, resource, and correctional settings. Outside of her professional work, she has worked abroad with various international education organizations as well as stateside with organizations facilitating upward mobility with disadvantaged populations. Heather is the Executive Director with her Bachelors in Special Education, Masters in Educational Psychology, and is currently pursuing her doctorate.
Dig into the research behind this topic — plain-English summaries written for BCBAs.
258 research articles with practitioner takeaways
252 research articles with practitioner takeaways
239 research articles with practitioner takeaways
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All behavior-analytic intervention is individualized. The information on this page is for educational purposes and does not constitute clinical advice. Treatment decisions should be informed by the best available published research, individualized assessment, and obtained with the informed consent of the client or their legal guardian. Behavior analysts are responsible for practicing within the boundaries of their competence and adhering to the BACB Ethics Code for Behavior Analysts.