We all love hearing about the children who are huge success stories. It is amazing when a child we work with is able to go on to college, make friends, go to school without special education services, or in general lead a rich and meaningful life. Several times, I have heard from parents many years after treatment, and it is always thrilling to get these types of reports.
Unfortunately, those victories aren’t the typical case. Some of the clients that we work with are going to require lifelong support. Therefore, it is essential that BCBAs have an idea of what environments our clients are likely to experience later in life. I was lucky–during my training I had the opportunity to work with all age ranges from babies to adults. But most BCBAs aren’t so lucky. Many receive training with just one or two different types of populations or age ranges.
One thing that I think every BCBA should do is visit programs. It is a great way to Poogi. But don’t only visit programs that are doing similar work to what you are doing. If you work with babies or preschoolers, go visit a middle school or high school program and see what it is like. If you work with highschoolers, go see an adult program. If you have never visited other programs, I can virtually guarantee it will be an eye-opener, and lead to new ideas about how to substantially POOGI your current program.
What you start to see is that we spend time on things that don’t matter in the long run. Visiting programs is sometimes a wake-up call that teaches us to focus on the things that are really going to make a difference.