Author: Michelle Schrader

Scheduling Delays Due to COVID-19

August 11, 2020

COVID-19 is impacting all of us in different ways. Right now, Pearson VUE is working hard to facilitate candidate scheduling for BACB examinations as quickly as possible. This is not easily accomplished in a time when test centers are experiencing significantly reduced capacity or being shut down with little, if any, advance notice. Pearson VUE testing centers must comply with orders to reduce capacity, along with all other COVID-19 social distancing requirements. Please keep in mind that, in most states, examination administrations at Pearson VUE centers were completely shut down for several weeks, and many are now operating at a significantly reduced capacity.

Unfortunately, this means that some of you may be experiencing longer than usual wait times when calling Pearson VUE. You may also encounter scheduling difficulties in states where test center capacities have been significantly reduced. Rest assured, as systems are being adapted to help facilitate your examination scheduling. As such measures are taken, you may see adjustments to your exam appointment (location, date, and/or time) in response to a facility reduction requirement or another change that impacts your previously scheduled examination. Check out the Pearson VUE FAQ for more information about adaptations to address COVID-19. Please pay special attention to whether your exam times are AM or PM. One of the adaptations made by Pearson VUE has been to extend exam center hours, with some operating nearly 24 hours a day.

We thank you for your patience and understanding.

BACB Account Change: New Background Information Options

The BACB recently updated the Background Information page in all BACB accounts. We revised the options for the Gender and Race/Ethnicity fields and have also made changes to the Role in Behavior Analysis, Area of Professional Emphasis, and Primary Age of Clientele categories. At your convenience, please log into your BACB account to update your background information. Once enough data is collected, we will share the results on the BACB website.

2022 Requirements Transition Resource Documents

The BACB's eligibility requirements for BCBAs and BCaBAs will change on January 1, 2022, but these changes may affect applicants now if they plan to apply in 2022 or later. For guidance during this transition, please refer to our Requirements Transition Resource documents, which outline specific changes in eligibility requirements and provide instructions for applicants at all stages of preparation. You can find them on the BCBA and BCaBA pages under the Documents sections.

5 BACB Resources You May Not Know About

"I may not have gone where I intended to go, but I think I have ended up where I needed to be." — Douglas Adams, author

5 BACB Resources You May Not Know About

Finding a specific piece of information online isn't always the easiest task. And sometimes you aren't even sure what you're looking for until you find it.

Whether you're already certified as a behavior analyst or researching your career options, the BACB website can be a valuable resource. But you may not have discovered these five time–saving gems yet.

Knowing the Numbers

When you're considering a career in behavior analysis, it's important to look at the big picture. Understanding the growth curves for RBTs, BCaBAs, and BCBAs can give you the confidence and insight to make informed choices about which certification is appropriate for you to pursue.

That's why the BACB publishes certificant trends on its Certificant Data page. You can quickly find answers to these questions:

  • How many people hold certification at each level?
    Our graphs show current and historical data that can help you evaluate the number of new professionals that the BACB certifies each year.
  • How fast is each certification program growing?
    These same graphs tell a story about the growth trajectory of each certification program. For example, by looking at the data, you can see that the number of certified RBTs has grown from 328 when it was introduced in 2014 to 71,875 in 2020. That enormous jump that shows a fast–growing demand for credentialed RBTs. (Check out the Certificant Data page to see stats for BCaBAs and BCBAs.)

Staying Informed About Ethics

Understanding ethics requirements is a vital part of the profession of behavior analysis. That's why the BACB is scaling up the resources on its Ethics page.

You may already be familiar with the Ethics Code, which outlines what behavior analysts must do—and must not do—to best protect clients and others. The Code provides guidance on many ethics–related situations you may encounter as a behavior–analytic practitioner, such as:

  • avoiding conflicts of interest.
  • maintaining confidentiality.
  • using contracts and fees.
  • implementing behavior–change programs.
  • acting as a supervisor.

But there's much more to the BACB ethics resources than the Code documents. You'll also want to check out the following important sources of support for navigating ethics dilemmas.

Ethics Resources

In this section, you can access:

  • Ethics–Related Newsletters
    The BACB newsletter has delivered critical content to applicants and certificants since 2004. Under Ethics Resources, we've listed and linked to every newsletter that includes ethics information.
  • Ethics–Related Journals and Books
    Our behavior analysis ethics bibliography will save you time and legwork.
  • Common Code Violations
    Knowing about the common ethics violations is invaluable when supervising activities and for understanding policies within organizations. You'll find the most common ethics violations for 2018 and 2016–17 under Ethics Resources.

Reporting to the Ethics Department

If you need support in deciding whether to report a violation, you'll find what you need in this section, including:

Code–Enforcement Procedures

To learn about the steps that the BACB can take against someone's exam eligibility or certification, take a look at this section. The Code–Enforcement Procedures is your go–to resource, but you'll also see information about the types of and possible outcomes for disciplinary sanctions.

Ethics touches every aspect of a behavior analyst's professional life. The BACB's extensive ethics resources will help you obtain and maintain your certification so that you can continue changing lives.

Finding Your Behavior Analysis Subspecialty

The profession of behavior analysis is known primarily for its success in treating individuals with autism spectrum disorder and developmental disabilities. However, behavior analysis also offers opportunities in a variety of other subspecialties. Staying aware and knowledgeable about these other areas as the profession grows is a good strategy for anyone researching a career in behavior analysis.

An RBT, BCaBA, or BCBA might work with a variety of clients, including:

  • patients in mental health clinics.
  • children or adults with developmental disabilities.
  • children and teenagers in school settings.
  • older populations in their homes or in care facilities.
  • organizations that need guidance with safety, leadership, or performance.

To learn more about areas that would interest you, the BACB has published a library of informative videos and fact sheets focusing on a wide range of behavior analysis subspecialties.

Each BACB video features a subject matter expert who shares details about working in the subspecialty, such as problems a behavior analyst might treat and the science behind those methods. For example, if you like the idea of helping to improve performance in the workplace, you can learn about organizational behavior management (OBM) from Dr. John Austin, a leading expert in the field. He shares how research has shaped the industry and allowed OBM practitioners to empower employees and leaders for success.

If you want to see a snapshot of each subspecialty and associated sub–areas with resources and recommended reading, check out our handy PDF fact sheets.

Staying in the Know

We know that waiting is one of the hardest parts of obtaining certification, especially when submitting applications or other electronic documents. That's why our Customer Service team shares daily updates about processing times on the BACB website. Our team processes materials in the order they are received, so you can be sure we'll get to yours as soon as possible.

For example, if you submitted your renewal application electronically on May 20th, you can check the Customer Service page regularly to see if we're processing materials received on that date yet.

In addition to processing times, you'll see instructions for system errors or notifications related to your BACB account.

Still haven't found what you need? The Customer Service page also includes links to frequently accessed resources for each certification, such as renewals, requirements, and applications.

Taking Advantage of the Data

The BACB Resources page provides a wealth of information about job demand, BACB activities, past ethics violations, and much more. Here's what you'll find:

  • Employment demand for behavior analysts
    When you're researching a career in behavior analysis, it can be helpful to investigate state–specific data. The BACB provides two reports showing demand for behavior analysts from 2010 to 2019 and from 2012 to 2014 by state.
  • Ethics violations data
    While the BACB Ethics page is the go–to source for ethics requirements and violations, you'll find unique information on the BACB Resources page. A Summary of Ethics Violations and Code–Enforcement Activities: 2016–2017 tells you what kinds of code-enforcement activities occurred during the two years after the Ethics Code was released.
  • BACB–authored publications
    Check out numerous journal articles related to the profession of behavior analysis, including history, requirements, training, education, and much more.

Finding the right links, documents, and data doesn't have to be an accident. Bookmark these indispensable BACB resources to stay in the know and save time.

The BACB: What It Is, What It Does, and Why

The BACB: What It Is, What It Does, and Why

It doesn't matter if you have been a BACB certificant for many years, are newly certified, or are just starting to explore becoming a practitioner in behavior analysis—it is likely that you have a number of questions about the landscape of the applied behavior analysis (ABA) profession. There are many reasons for this, but chief among them is that ABA is a relatively new profession, with professional credentialing only existing for a few decades. This is where the importance of understanding the role of the BACB in the profession comes in.

The BACB was established in 1998 to meet the credentialing needs of ABA practitioners, governments, and consumers of ABA services. In the BACB's early years, its certification programs grew consistently but slowly. In its first 13 years, the BACB certified 10,000 individuals. In the last seven years, this number has grown to more than 100,000 certificants! In addition, since 2009, 31 states have passed laws to license behavior analysts. These developments mean that professional certification and the credentialing of ABA practitioners are relatively recent events, about which many people have questions. These include: What is the BACB's role? What is credentialing and why is it important? Why can't the BACB speak for behavior analysis? Why are there so many acronyms!?

While we can't address every question, we hope to answer a few.

What Is The BACB?

The Behavior Analyst Certification Board (BACB) is:

  • A nonprofit organization — The BACB was founded in Florida as a nonprofit corporation in 1998 and has 501(c)(3) tax–exempt status from the IRS. Both of these legal and regulatory frameworks place important limits on BACB activity.
  • A credentialing organization — The primary function of the BACB is to operate certification programs, similar to a regulatory entity. In this role, the BACB provides practice requirements, an ethics code, and a disciplinary system designed to protect consumers, among other certification–program activities. In this capacity, ABA practitioners must interact with the BACB regularly to maintain their certification.

What Is Credentialing and Why Is It Important?

As mentioned earlier, the BACB's certification programs exist as a regulatory–like mechanism to protect consumers of behavior–analytic services. To protect consumers, the BACB establishes entry–level eligibility standards for education and training AND provides a mechanism to discipline behavior analysis practitioners who violate their ethics code.

Professional Credentialing

Credentialing is vital to behavior analysis because of the particularly vulnerable populations that a majority of behavior–analytic practitioners serve. Without credentialing, how would we know who is qualified to enter the profession and who isn't?
Two of the many differences between private certification and government–issued licensure are highlighted in the boxes below because these are the two primary ways behavior analysts are credentialed to practice.

Private Certification (BACB)

  • Voluntary
  • Disciplinary enforcement is limited to those who are certified by the BACB and the consequences are limited to revocation of certification.

Licensure (31 states)

  • Mandatory
  • Disciplinary enforcement may be enacted upon anyone practicing, with or without a license, and consequences include substantial fines and possible incarceration.

 

In ABA, practitioners who obtain certification by the BACB have a great deal of mobility because their certification will meet licensure requirements in almost any state with licensure for the practice of behavior analysis. For more information about US state licensure, please refer to the BACB's US Regulation of Behavior Analysts or visit APBA's Licensure and Other Regulation of ABA Practitioners webpage.

NCCA Accreditation and Consumer Protection

All three of the BACB's current certification programs are accredited by the National Commission for Certifying Agencies (NCCA). The BACB must adhere to NCCA–established processes, similar to the way BACB certificants and applicants must meet BACB requirements.

Using the NCCA processes, the BACB convenes groups of subject matter experts (SMEs) to evaluate and potentially revise requirements for each BACB credential. SME recommendations are then voted on by the BACB Board of Directors before they are adopted. Through this process, the requirements change as needed to ensure greater consumer protection through standards that accurately reflect the ever–evolving practice of behavior analysis. As usual, everything comes back to consumer protection.

For anyone interested in a little more reading about the processes that are used by the BACB to develop standards and examinations, they are outlined in a number of our publications and can be found on our Resources webpage. In addition, you can give us feedback if you have suggestions for future SMEs to consider as they revise requirements in the future.

What Is the BACB's Role in The ABA Profession?

The major professional organizations in ABA have very specific missions and roles and substantial limitations on their activities from various sources. These limitations include state laws where the organization was founded as a nonprofit, IRS rules, and for the BACB, our NCCA accreditation requirements. Let's start with the role of the BACB.

To recap, as we mentioned earlier, the BACB's job is to credential practitioners of behavior analysis and to coordinate with regulatory authorities. Although we are sometimes called upon to engage in advocacy and political and social commentary, our involvement in these activities is necessarily restricted by some of the entities mentioned earlier. In our regulatory–like role, the BACB is prohibited from engaging in political activity and has very strict limitations on its acceptable activities. That said, a number of the questions we receive indicate that some think of the BACB as a professional membership association, with flexibility about our public behavior. This is just not true. Although we sometimes wish we could engage in a broader array of advocacy activities, we have a very limited role in ABA—again, due to restrictions imposed upon us by certain legal statutes and IRS rules. It's useful to think about the BACB as similar to a licensure board, since we serve a similar and often interrelated regulatory function. It is notable to mention here that other professions may have certification boards that look like the BACB in function but are regulated differently under law and IRS rules, which allows them greater flexibility than the BACB. We know that this makes understanding our limitations pretty tricky!

A professional membership association is charged with representing the interests of its members and speaking on behalf of a profession. The BACB doesn't have members; we have certificants. Fortunately, ABA has a number of state, provincial, and national professional associations to serve the membership role.

Two major professional membership associations in behavior analysis are the Association of Professional Behavior Analysts (APBA) and the Association for Behavior Analysis International (ABAI). These organizations were established to provide different services than a certification board and are permitted much more flexibility in their permissible activities, including making public statements and taking a stand on social issues. We strongly encourage our certificants to become members in their state and national professional associations if they have not already. In fact, at the very beginning of a certificant's professional experience, we send a welcome letter encouraging them to join and become involved in their relevant professional associations. The professional membership associations are permitted to engage in a wide range of important activities. They are truly the voice of behavior analysis and have the primary obligation to represent our profession.

Because the BACB cannot speak on behalf of the profession of behavior analysis, we hope all certificants and practitioners join their state and national professional membership associations. Together, membership associations, the BACB, and, most importantly, behavior analysis practitioners and stakeholders can work to improve the discipline of behavior analysis.
If you're interested in hearing more about this topic, check out Episode 11 of the BACB's podcast, Inside the BACB.

Certification Program Requirements: Requests for Future Changes

The BACB has created an online contact form that allows certificants and other stakeholders to submit requirements recommendations to our subject matter expert committees. If you have recommendations that you would like the committee to hear at their next requirements review, please complete the Certification Program Requirements: Requests for Future Changes contact form. This is an easy and efficient way to suggest certification requirements updates and changes directly to the BACB.