Join us for AMeBA's first Fall Workshop
Join us on Friday December 6th from 9 to 1:30~ This half day workshop will be hosted through Zoom, and will include interactive portions. Get 4 Ethics CEUs for only $80, or attend without CEUs for $50!
Creating Legally Defensible FBAs and BIPs
Abstract
This workshop is designed for special education administrators, behavior analysts and other professionals who supervise or conduct and implement functional behavior assessments (FBA) and behavior intervention plans (BIP) in schools. The federal government special education law (IDEA) includes very little information or guidance regarding who, when, what and how FBAs or BIPs are needed or what needs to be included in the reports. This means that each state and/or local education agency is left to decide the format, content and means of implementing effective FBAs and BIPs. Not surprisingly, there have been many schools and families that have found themselves in court to decide whether a student(s) has been provided with an appropriate and effective FBA and/or BIP that is helping the student to make progress in his/her goals and objectives. This workshop and information is based on a research article that is currently In Press with the peer reviewed journal Remedial and Special Education.
This workshop will review the federal law AND the case law and provide a guidance document that currently outlines for us the who, how, what, when and where needed in order to develop FBAs and BIPs that can be reliably defensible in a court of law, while also being useful for school staff and effective for implementation with students.
Objectives
1. Participants will be able to identify the current areas of FBAs and BIPs on which special education case law has focused for change and improvement.
2. Participants will be able to identify the eight sections necessary for a legally defensible FBA.
3. Participants will be able to identify the ten sections necessary for a legally defensible BIP.
Sonja R. de Boer is a Board Certified Behavior Analyst-Doctoral (BCBA-D) and obtained her Ph.D. in 2005 in special education and psychology and research in education at the University of Kansas, with an emphasis on early intervention for children with Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASD). She has 30 years of experience working in early childhood special education, early intervention behavior intervention services, Applied Behavior Analysis (ABA), with students with disabilities, and specifically children with ASD. Sonja is currently a Special Education Director for a Maine island school, a Behavior Analyst Consultant for a school district in central Maine, a faculty member for Tufts University Medical Center in Child Psychiatry and the chair of the planning committee for the Annual Richard L. Simpson Autism Conference. She also provides training, consultation and expert-witness services around the nation regarding interventions for children with ASD and creating and implementing legally defensible FBAs and BIPs.
She is the author of the book Successful Inclusion Practices for Children with Autism: Creating a Complete, Effective, ASD Inclusion Program (currently being revised and updated for publication); Discrete Trial Training, 2nd edition (part of the How To Series on Autism Spectrum Disorders); is one of the original co-authors of the seminal research in evidence-based interventions for children and youth with ASD - first edition of Autism Spectrum Disorders: Interventions and Treatments for Children and Youth written with Richard Simpson in 2005. And after two years of research, she and two of her colleagues, just (July 2023) published the first book for educators on evidence-based interventions for children with ASD: An Educators’ Guide to Autism Spectrum Disorder: Interventions and Treatments: By Educators for Educators. And she just wrote and published the final article in a series of seven in the Autism Advocate magazine titled Proactive and Preventative Behavior Intervention Strategies for Children with Autism.
Cancellation Policy
Cancellations received in writing (treasurer@mainebehavioranalysis.org) by November 29, 2024, will receive a full refund, minus a $10 cancellation fee. No refunds will be provided for cancellation requests received after November 29.