Positive Behavior Support, Graduate Certificate

In addition to University Requirements:

• Complete individual plan requirements.

Please note that students may be able to use some courses to meet more than one requirement. Contact your advisor for details.

Students must first be accepted into the Graduate Certificate in PBS by applying online.

Purpose Statement

Positive Behavior Support (PBS) is an approach to improving human behavior by making challenging behavior unnecessary and preferred behavior easy and effective. PBS emphasizes improving the quality of life for individuals with challenging behavior, and replacing challenging behavior with socially acceptable alternative behavior. Applied Behavior Analysis (ABA) is the science behind the approach, and PBS employs research-validated behavioral practices of teaching and reinforcing behavior for individual children and adults as well as for groups of people. Attention is focused on understanding the conditions in the environment that contribute to challenging behavior, and modifying those conditions to strengthen desirable behavior. The graduate certificate in PBS combines the knowledge and skills of ABA with the attitude and research of PBS. The Behavior Analyst Certification Board®, Inc. has verified the courses in the PBS Graduate Certificate program toward the coursework requirements for eligibility to take the Board Certified Behavior Analyst® (Option 1) examination under the 5th edition Task List. There are 7 courses in the PBS Graduate Certification program, which will require 3 to 7 semesters to complete (depending on how many courses are taken each term). Applicants will need to meet additional requirements before they can be deemed eligible to take the examination (e.g., have relevant Master’s degree, collect specified number of hours of supervised practice). Although not certified in behavior analysis based on completion of the program, our graduates help parents, teachers, and others who support people with disabilities and challenging behavior, develop interventions that enhance the quality of life for everyone involved, and facilitate meaningful differences in self-determination and daily functioning.

Student Learning Outcomes
 
Graduates of the PBS certificate program will demonstrate the ability to:

• Explain the effect of various quality of life factors on the development and maintenance of challenging behavior (including disabling conditions, family and cultural factors);
• Demonstrate a functional understanding of operant and respondent conditioning and how each contributes to the development and maintenance of challenging behavior;
• Prioritize meaningful goals for behavioral reduction and skill increase in collaboration with the focal individual and members of his/her system of support;
• Develop systems for collecting and analyzing data to determine functional relations between the individual's behavior (including verbal behavior) and surrounding environmental events across settings and activities;
• Utilize the principles and applications of applied behavior analysis (e.g., discrimination training, shaping, chaining, fading, differential reinforcement, self-management, planned generalization) for making problem behavior irrelevant, inefficient, and ineffective, while increasing the individual's ability to accomplish goals in socially acceptable ways;
• Conduct risk-benefit analyses in practical applications of learning and behavior change that are culturally responsive and sensitive to environmental features;
• Design behavior monitoring systems to track changes in behavior/skills over time and summarize the results of those observations in visual (graphic) format to facilitate understanding and data-based decision making among all team members;
• Develop systems for ensuring that interventions are implemented with fidelity, and provide the leadership necessary to creatively resolve barriers to implementation;
• Describe a problem-solving process in which ethical dilemmas can be identified and resolved using the BACB Professional and Ethical Compliance Code for Behavior Analysts (2014);
• Monitor and evaluate emerging research-based practices in applied behavior analysis and PBS, and apply these practices in service delivery for the purpose of improving the quality of life of individuals with challenge behaviors and those who care about them.