Nevada ABA – 2025 Annual Report – Inside Behavior Analysis

By Steven Anbro

NABA has continued to work on improvement via a series of key initiatives that were put in place by previous boards with a growing emphasis on providing additional resources for members. Nevada Association for Behavior Analysis (NABA) has continued to prioritize the growth of the organization with increased outreach throughout the state and throughout the profession (all levels of study or credential).

NABA continues to take an active role in matters of public policy that impact behavior analysts in our state. Having previously (2017) supported approved legislation to remove the regulation of behavior analysis from the purview of the Board of Psychological Examiners and instantiate a Board of Applied Behavior Analysis housed within the state Aging and Disability Services Division, in 2021, NABA promoted legislation to establish the state ABA board as a fully independent and autonomous entity. During the 2023 legislative session, NABA’s public policy committee worked alongside stakeholders to pass SB191, increasing the Medicaid service age cap from 20 to 26 years old. Medicaid subsequently removed the age cap entirely after the passage of SB191. During the same session, the public policy committee was instrumental in avoiding a Medicaid rate decrease across multiple CPT codes. NABA’s public policy also maintains a collaborative relationship with the Nevada Board of Behavior Analysis, the state’s licensing entity. Through this collaboration, NABA supported adjustments to the licensure law, addressing issuance fees for licensure. The NABA Public Policy Committee is currently collaborating with stakeholders statewide to address access issues. The NABA Public Policy Committee is also working to address new legislation introduced during the 2025 session.

Additionally, NABA has made it a priority to offer learning opportunities throughout the year. In 2024, NABA organized several virtual events featuring renowned speakers in the field of ABA which were free to attend and included a very minimal fee for attendees interested in earning CEUs. The events were well attended, with attendance trending upward throughout the year. We are continuing to focus on this initiative, which is led by our Outreach Committee, and we have a handful of excellent virtual speaker events for the 2025 year.

With NABA’s Outreach Committee taking over the role of organizing monthly speaker and CEU events for the membership and broader community, the Practice Committee continues its supportive, practical role for the state’s practitioners at all levels. In particular, the Practice Committee is working to develop ongoing and meaningful supports for RBTs in the state, who are not yet in need of CEUs but who are often in need of guidance and informal supports (i.e., not formal supervision oversight) from veteran practitioners who can offer a wide array of practical knowledge and wisdom. The Practice Committee is working to offer sustained virtual and in-person meetings aimed at connecting practitioners in their respective regions and across the state and establishing a support network for professionals to share their experiences, ask questions, and learn from one another.

NABA held an outstanding single-track conference in October 2024, which featured a line-up of renowned speakers across four domains: basic, applied, theory, and organizational behavior management (OBM). The conference was held at the Whitney Peak in downtown Reno and was well attended, allowing NABA to continue to operate with financial stability. Our 2025 conference will be held at a new venue, MEET Las Vegas, in October 2024, with another outstanding speaker lineup. For the 2025 conference, we are assessing working further with a third-party vendor to maintain our hybrid conference, which would allow attendees from out of state to attend virtually, obtain CEUs, and hopefully generate revenue for NABA. Lastly, although it may seem early to be a point of focus, we are excited to announce that our annual conference will be reinstating our Reno/Vegas conference rotation, which we hope will help further engage practitioners in the southern region of our state. This has been a goal of the organization for some time now and we are excited to see the return of our conference in Las Vegas.

None of this would be possible without the hard work of the NABA Board, NABA Committee Chairs, and NABA Committee members. The NABA Executive Board changes over each year in January and each Executive Board Member serves an elect year prior to the start of their term.

Current NABA leadership is listed below:

President: Steven Anbro, Ph.D., BCBA-D

President-Elect: Gwen Johnson, Ph.D., BCBA-D, LBA

Treasurer: Megan Szeto, M.A., BCBA, LBA

Treasurer-Elect: Veronica Smith, M.Ed., BCBA, LBA

Secretary: Nicole Tamura, M.Ed., BCBA, LBA

Secretary-Elect: Kathleen Soyka, M.A., BCBA, LBA

At-Large Representative: Delaney Carlovsky, M.A.

At-Large Representative-Elect: Janet Dai, Ph.D., BCBA-D, LBA

Student Representative: Brittney Pauli

Student Representative-Elect: Finley Aavatsmark

NABA Committee Chairs: Gwen Johnson, Ph.D., BCBA-D, LBA (Public Policy) Laurie Tarter, Psy.D., BCBA, LBA (Practice) Samantha Lemons, M.A., BCBA, LBA (Outreach)

For more information on NABA:

Visit our website: www.nevadaaba.org

Email us at board@nevadaaba.org

Connect with us on LinkedIn: Nevada Association for Behavior Analysis

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