South Carolina

By Jacqui Williams


2023 was a successful year for South Carolina ABA (SC ABA). Board members included President Katie Wolfe, President-Elect Jacqui Williams, Secretary Kim Snyder, Treasurer Anslie Patrick, At-Large board member Katie Franke, and Student Representative, Amy Eacho.

In 2023 we provided multiple high-quality free CEs to SC ABA members in addition to our annual conference, as well as one ethics event hosted by our ethics chair. We also had two invited speakers present CE sessions free to members in 2023, outside of the conference. Dr. Trina Spencer presented about ollaboration and Dr. Nasiah Cirincione-Ulezi presented about leadership.

We continued our licensure efforts, detailed below, and continued conversations around working towards diversity, equity, and inclusion in the organization.

Legislative Affairs Committee: In 2023, the legislative affairs committee continued to work with our lobbyist to develop grassroots efforts to develop relationships with and educate state representatives about applied behavior analysis.

Social Committee: Jennifer Elkins remains our social chair for 2023. She organized several events around the state.

Ethics Committee: We held one Zoom ethics CE event in 2023 that was well-attended by SC ABA members. Nicole Orsini remains our ethics chair since January 2023.

Special Interest Groups (SIGs): In 2023, we developed five SIGs: Organizational Behavior Management, School-Based ABA, Business Owners, Diversity Equity and Inclusion, and Collaboration. SIGs meet every other month and are led by SC ABA members.

We had a few other changes in leadership in 2023:

  • Anslie Patrick (treasurer) transitioned off the board and Stephanie Turner stepped into the role.
  • Katie Franke (member at large) transitioned off the board and Scott Herbst stepped into the role.

In addition to these efforts, we held an in-person conference in October 2023, with 228 attendees. We recorded all sessions and made recordings available after the conference to all attendees. An additional 50 people attend virtually, making this our largest conference to date. We continued to offer multiple tracks and for the first time we were able to offer 10 scholarships for both in person and virtual attendance. Our presenters included:

  • Dr. Alice Shillingsburg, Strengthening Gestures: A critical component for Building Robust Communication Skills
  • Dr. Colin Muething, Relapse when treating behavior targeted for reduction
  • Dr. Scott Herbst, The language of leaders – applying principles of relational frame theory to upgrade team culture
  • Dr. Susan Wilczynski, Diversity Affirming evidence based practice
  • We also held breakout sessions! We had 4 sets of 3 concurrent sessions:

Dr. Shillingsburg, What you teach and how you teach matters: implementing an applied verbal behavior approach

Dr. Herbst, ACT for yourself….for others—Applying ACT personally as an access to using with clients, families and supervisees

Dr. Plattner, Improving Compassionate Care Skills through Motivational Interviewing Training: A group Design

Dr. Seiverling & Dr. Williams, Current state of the behavior analytics feeding interventions literature

Ms. Kelly Bryson & Ms. Beth Ann Daily, Grown-up ABA: Shifting to Assent-Based treatment with adults

Ms. Stephanie Turner, A spectrum of services: autism resources in South Carolina

Dr. Dawes, A model for providing comprehensive assent-based practice

Dr. LeJeune & Ms. Shaunita Grase, How effective collaboration can be your superpower as a behavior analyst

Dr. Plattner, Why didn’t they teach us that in grad school? A curriculum for ethical practice and leadership skills amidst rapid growth

Mr. Aaron Check, Quality of life as a guiding construct for service provision

Ms. Annamarie Stoudenmire & Ms. Kaelynn Partlow, Should I select a Goal because an assessment told me to?

Attendees appreciated that recordings were available after the conference, which allowed them to access all the great content from concurrent sessions. We received great feedback on the presentations from our members! Our 2024 conference will be in Greenville, SC on November 4–5, 2024.

For more information about our conferences, membership, or upcoming events, please visit our website, www.sc-aba.org, or like us on Facebook (South Carolina Association for Behavior Analysis). As a perk of SC ABA membership, updates are regularly provided to members on relevant legislature, area events related to behavior analysis, and changes affecting providers.


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