CFS Educational Programs

The Department of Child & Family Studies offers cutting-edge education programs, ranging from training for family members to graduate programs for tomorrow's leaders. Academic programs are part of the scholastic offerings of the University of South Florida School of Mental Health Studies. Below are brief descriptions, and links to more information on how you can participate in these learning experiences.

Graduate Programs

Master's degree in Applied Behavior Analysis (ABA)

The master's degree program in applied behavior analysis (ABA) is designed to meet the growing need in Florida and nationally for practitioners who can work effectively within systems to improve the quality of services in the fields of developmental disabilities, education, child protective services, rehabilitation, mental health, and business and technology. ABA provides an approach for developing, implementing, and evaluating practical strategies to produce changes in socially significant behaviors of individuals in the context of community settings. The 42-credit-hour master's degree in ABA is interdisciplinary and is housed in the Graduate School. It provides coursework and practical supervision across three colleges (College of Arts and Sciences, College of Education, and the Louis de la Parte Florida Mental Health Institute). For more information on the program, contact Raymond Miltenberger at abausf@fmhi.usf.edu or see the USF listing.

Graduate Certificate in Children's Mental Health: Systems of Care

The Certificate’s course content provides current knowledge about effective service delivery to graduate students seeking specialized training in children’s mental health, and professionals in need of retooling in order to keep pace with the fundamental changes that have taken place in the field. This is an interdisciplinary program delivered through distance learning technologies. It is designed to provide a rigorous, empirically-based education to individuals in the behavioral health services field who wish to work with agencies and systems that serve children and families who have mental health needs. For enrollment information, contact Carol MacKinnon-Lewis or see the USF listing.

Graduate Certificate in Mental Health Planning, Evaluation & Accountability

This graduate certificate program is aimed at preparing individuals to evaluate mental health and substance abuse service programs, determine whether they can be improved and how, and if they are efficient and cost effective. Designed for professionals in mental health, human services, public health, education, addiction services, and related behavioral health fields, it provides in-depth training in a broad range of techniques and strategies for improving outcomes, and for applying findings to policy development for mental health and substance abuse services. See USF listing or contact Bruce Levin

Training Programs

Center for Autism and Related Disabilities (CARD) Training Programs

The Center for Autism and Related Disabilities (CARD-USF) at the University of South Florida is a community-based project that provides information and consultation to individuals diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder and related disabilities. CARD at USF is one of six regional CARD sites funded by the Florida State Legislature and offers instruction and coaching to families and professionals through a training and assistance model. See the CARD training schedule.

Florida’s Positive Behavior Support Project

The Florida’s Positive Behavior Support Project provides training and technical assistance to increase the capacity of Florida school districts to implement evidence-based practices for supporting students with and without disabilities who are exhibiting problem behaviors. The Project provides training to district and school personnel in school-wide, targeted group, classroom, and individual levels of PBS. Technical assistance activities include the dissemination of data, newsletters, effective practices and web-based resources.

Program-wide Positive Behavior Support Training Series

The Program-Wide PBS project was funded by the Children’s Board of Hillsborough County to support the program-wide adoption of the teaching pyramid model for supporting the development of young children’s social competence and addressing challenging behavior. This project provides training and support to selected early childhood programs in Hillsborough County and monthly workshops open to the community. These workshops offer proven strategies for promoting social skills and addressing challenging behavior for early childhood programs in Hillsborough County. For the Fall 2007 Schedule of workshops, contact Rochelle Lentini.

Interdisciplinary Training on Supports and Services for Individuals with Developmental Disabilities

The Florida Center for Inclusive Communities is involved in the development of both pre-service and in-service training programs for professionals and community members who provide supports and services to individuals with developmental disabilities. If you are interested in receiving information on our training opportunities, please contact Bobbie Vaughn.

Positive Beginnings Training Modules

The Positive Beginnings training modules provide higher education faculty and professional development personnel with material that can be used to teach early educators, interventionists, and related service personnel about the use of Positive Behavior Support (PBS) with young children and their families. The content of the modules provides a comprehensive curriculum in Positive Behavior Support in 6, three-hour modules. These modules are available for purchase at minimal cost ($15). Faculty members with the Florida Center for Inclusive Communities are available to provide “train-the-trainers” workshops on the adoption of the materials. For more information, contact Lise Fox.

Teaching Tools for Young Children

Teaching tools offers expert guidance on strategies to use and materials for making supports and provides teachers with strategies and resources to develop behavior support strategies for young children who are demonstrating challenging behavior in preschool settings. Faculty members with the Florida Center for Inclusive Communities are available to provide workshops on how to use Teaching Tools. For more information, contact Bobbie Vaughn.

 

On-line Inservice Training

In-Service Training in Children's Mental Health

To help translate new knowledge into effective practice, the Graduate Curriculum on Children's Mental Health has been re-packaged into in-service training modules to benefit an array of behavioral health professionals. This initiative includes a range of in-service programs and approaches to help bridge the gap between research and practice to improve services for children with mental health challenges and their families.

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