Services
ABTA is proud to offer services to assist Local Education Agencies in meeting the educational needs of their students with ASD. Inservice Training, Program Assistance/Review and Comprehensive Institutes for Educators are among the services we provide to help build capacity within public education settings and programs.
In-Service Training
ABTA offers half-day and full-day in-service trainings on topics identified as Best Practice for Children with Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASD). These topics include:
Inservice Descriptions (Requires Adobe Acrobat Reader)
NOTE: Other inservice topics available upon request.
Comprehensive Institutes for Educators
In addition to the inservice topics listed above, ABTA can develop a series of trainings designed to meet the specific needs of your staff. Following a needs assessment, we work with the LEA to develop a series of trainings that will meet the training needs of the identified staff in the areas that are identified as “Best Practice”. A Pre and Post test are implemented to insure that participants have gained the requisite level of content knowledge. Many LEAs provide a “Certificate of Competency” to participants to honor their accomplishments, document the areas of competence and number of training hours provided. CEUs can also be arranged with College or University programs.
Institutes can be developed for multidisciplinary groups or for specific professional groups. ABTA has provided this type of comprehensive training package for Teachers, Administrators, Paraeducators and parents in LEAs all over California.
Program Assistance
Program assistance is designed to:
a. Help your team set up new programs which are appropriate for individuals on the Autism Spectrum.
b. Improve or revamp existing programs to be more effective for children on the Autism Spectrum.
Program assistance consists of the following:
Needs Assessment: During this phase, we discuss current program needs with staff and administrators and outline the goals of the program assistance review. This process may include staff questionnaires and interviews.
Program Review: A Program Review can be conducted as a Guided Self Review or as an Independent Review
A Guided Self Review allows your educational team to self-evaluate their own program with guidance and input from an ABTA Associate. This is done in a workshop format using the APDAR Protocols as a tool for self evaluation and self improvement. This process is suggested for experienced team (teams who have been implementing ASD program for 2 or more years).
In an Independent Review, an ABTA associate observes the program. Gathering data using the APDAR Protocol, we score the program on instructional, environmental, administrative and procedural elements. We also evaluate documentation and look at measures of program outcomes to insure that protocols are being followed in accordance with Ed. Code and current best practices.
Debriefing: A comprehensive report which outlines strengths and areas of potential improvement is written. ABTA gives specific suggestions for improving the program, as well as recommendations for further staff training and development. A debriefing session is held to discuss the report and outline potential strategies for implementing the suggestions.
Follow Up: Follow up training, coaching and/or review of specific program components can be arranged to assist the staff with implementation of the suggestions provided by ABTA.
Hours: To be determined by program administrators and ABTA staff. Please also see the attached Inservice Training Overview and Descriptions for a summary of possible training topics.