Taylor Covington, M.A., BCBA, LBA, is our competent, compassionate Clinical Director in Warwick, RI. She has a bachelor’s of science in psychology with a focus in early childhood and a master’s in Applied Behavior Analysis. She has been a BCBA since 2022 and has worked at ACP since 2019. Taylor’s journey on Team ACP is unique in that she’s grown with us from a Behavior Technician to the Clinical Director role, a true “home grown” clinician! We sat with Taylor to discuss her role and what makes her team so special. We know you’ll want to read more!
What does your role entail at ACP?
It’s kind of unique because a Clinical Director, you’re still working as a BCBA, too. I have a caseload of clients where I work really closely with their families and with Speech and OT and kind of work together to come up with the best plan to help these kiddos reach their goals, whether that’s communication goals, some fine motor, gross motor goals, and skills and stuff like that, decreasing maladaptive behavior and then replacing it with something more functional or something that’s going to help them be more independent and integrate into the community.
What’s your favorite part about being a Clinical Director?
I think that my favorite part is honestly that I get to work with all the families instead of just the families on my caseload. I get to see the progress of not only a small handful of kids, but a larger group. And then getting to collaborate across disciplines, collaborate with the BCBAs …. I get to see these kiddos all the way back from the intake process, all the way through to graduation. I get to work with all the kids instead of just a handful. It’s definitely my favorite part.
What was it like growing within the company?
It’s been awesome. It’s really satisfying to see and think back, especially like being a Clinical Director, I get to work really closely with all the staff, too. It’s nice to see when people first get started, sometimes when they come for a tour, they’ll be so nervous about like, I don’t know what this is. And I always like to use the anecdote of like, I had no idea what ABA was either. It’s a really great way to mentor and push people through all the way.
Because all of our BTs are so capable of so much growth.
And it’s nice that I can say I have personal experience of learning through here and being kind of like ACP-raised and learn the whole process. So that’s been awesome, and it’s been great to just kind of look back and think of when I was a BT, I really didn’t know anything about ABA. And yes, school was part of that journey, but also like getting the hands-on experience here. It’s been great to meet so many people and feel comfortable around so many different people too, because I’ve been here since the beginning.
Can you talk about some of the growth you’ve seen of ACP?
It’s crazy. I always say, I remember when I first started, there were probably like 10 clients total. So it was great because I mean, we got to get to know a lot of different kids. We used to do home sessions, things like that. It’s been great to see this really good structure come to the company and the more that we’ve grown and the more that we’ve learned about how the ABA field is moving and how we can move along with it has been really great. It’s just been awesome to see the structure grow and grow and grow and they’re so great about taking feedback in and taking experiences in … growing the mentee program. It’s just, it’s really been awesome to see.
Can you talk a bit about having multidisciplinary services at your center?
I think that that is honestly my favorite part about working here, having that collaboration and having it be so easily accessible. So if in a parent meeting, a caregiver has a question about their child’s AAC device, it’s so nice to have Morgan or Maddie right there for me to be like, Hey, I have a question about this.
It helps like the BCBAs stay ethical and in our scope of confidence. We don’t have to speak on something that we don’t know, because we have a resource right there. It really helps with those replacement behaviors too, where if I have a child who is engaging in a lot of mouthing or a lot of sensory rocking, I have Emily and Sophia there as professionals in their field to ask, Hey, I see this behavior. It’s my job to work on decreasing it. What Occupational Therapy tools can we use?And having that carry over is so nice. And with the Feeding services too, if I have a client who during a session is engaging in avoidant behavior around food. I can reach out to any of them and ask, What are some tips that I could try? Or, Do you have any idea why they might be doing this? And kind of work together to come up with a solution instead of having to schedule an appointment with someone outpatient or call their office and their office calls our office. It’s just they’re right here in-house, and it’s so great.
How exactly would you describe Team Warwick?
I know this sounds really, really cliche, but I really would say like a family. I think working here for so long, you start to learn little things about everyone. All the BTs are really good friends. They’ll always be like talking about their wins together. That’s so great. We’ll see people are getting married and having babies and starting families. It’s been so great to get to know so many different people and see their journey. I think we are like a family because everyone always wants to share with each other and congratulate each other. It’s really awesome.
If all goes to plan, where do you see yourself five years from now?
That’s the hardest question. Definitely still growing with Team ACP. I love being a Clinical Director and seeing all the families and all the progress and all the staff. I don’t know exactly where, but I think just trusting the process and seeing what happens next and continue to grow and learn more things.
Team Warwick currently offers Applied Behavior Analysis and Speech, Occupational, and Feeding Therapy. Down the road you can also find our Warwick Psychological Assessment center that provides Diagnostics for a variety of clinical presentations, including Autism Spectrum Disorder. Want to take a virtual tour? Explore our Warwick, RI center today and then give us a call at 800-679-3609 or email Welcome@AutismCarePartners.com to connect!
