Strategies to Address Challenging Behaviors at School

Feeling frustrated by your students’ challenging behaviors and other special needs? Come get some practical tips and suggestions from four of the nonprofit Birchtree Center's behavior experts!

This workshop is for para-educators and other school staff. It begins with a 60-minute presentation followed by time for participants to ask questions and share ideas.

Admission is complimentary and reservations are encouraged but not required. Certificates of attendance will be available.

About the Presenters

Rachel DeCola, MEd, BCBA, holds a bachelor’s degree from Westfield State University and a master’s degree from Endicott College in Applied Behavior Analysis. She became a Board Certified Behavior Analyst in 2021. Before joining Birchtree’s team as a Clinical Instructor in 2017, she worked as a behavior technician as well as in the communications and hospitality fields. She was promoted to Senior Clinical Instructor and then to Behavior Analyst in 2021.

Sarah Dostie, MEd, BCBA, holds a Master’s of Education degree in Autism and Applied Behavior Analysis and is a Board Certified Behavior Analyst. Before she joined The Birchtree Center’s staff in 2012, she worked with students with autism in public-school and home-based settings and also worked at a group home for at-risk youth. She joined Birchtree’s staff as a Clinical Instructor in 2012 and was promoted to Senior Clinical Instructor in 2014 and to Behavior Analyst in 2015.

Blaire Luebkeman, MSEd, BCBA, earned a Master’s in Education with a focus on Curriculum and Instruction in Autism Studies at the University of Massachusetts. She earned a bachelor’s degree in Psychology from the University of New Hampshire. Ms. Luebkeman has worked in the field of Applied Behavior Analysis since 2003, providing in-home support services to a child with autism and his family before joining the Birchtree team as a Clinical Instructor in 2006. She was promoted to Senior Clinical Instructor in December 2008 and was promoted to Behavior Analyst in March 2013. She has been a Board Certified Behavior Analyst since 2013.

Elizabeth Prior, MEd, BCBA, holds a Master of Education in Behavior Analysis from Endicott College and a bachelor’s degree in psychology from Ohio Wesleyan University. Before joining Birchtree’s team, Elizabeth spent two years as an AmeriCorps member working with public school students in Manchester, NH. Elizabeth’s behavior analytic career began in 2018 when she was hired as a Clinical Instructor at Birchtree. Elizabeth provided school-based and in-home services to students with autism and went on to become a Registered Behavior Technician in 2019. She became a Board Certified Behavior Analyst in 2021 and was promoted to Behavior Analyst at Birchtree that same year.

About The Birchtree Center

The nonprofit Birchtree Center, based in Portsmouth, New Hampshire, transforms the lives of children and youth with autism in New Hampshire, Maine, and Massachusetts. Birchtree’s autism specialists travel 30,000+ miles per year to help students in their local public schools. Twenty-one school districts send students to Birchtree’s day school–the only school in New Hampshire that serves students with autism exclusively.