#smcmedstudies

Like our last SMP spotlight, Ms. Niccolini is a senior Psychology major and Ed. Studies minor. Her SMP, mentored by Dr. Katherine Koch, is titled “From the Mouths of the Observers:BCaBA and BCBA Perspectives on Special Education Settings.”

Ms. Niccolini, who is employed as a Registered Behavior Technician, says that she wanted to write about the viewpoints of BCaBA/BCBAs (Behavior Analysts) on inclusion vs. self-contained classrooms. She explains that there is a significant amount of research about the opinions of teachers and parents, but that BCaBAs and BCBAs have not been included in the literature nearly as much.

She says that the hardest part of her SMP is finding a decent sample size: behavior analysis is a growing field, and BCaBA/BCBAs are in short supply. However, she is personally interested in the research, and is enjoying reading the existing literature.

The Educational Studies minor at SMCM can be part of a pathway towards the MAT, or can be added as a useful supplement to any major/career path.

When I began my Ed Studies minor, I had every intention of using it as part of the MAT prereqs. But now, as a senior, I have realized that I won’t be applying to to MAT.

Don’t get me wrong. I absolutely love the MAT program, and I feel it has so much to offer for future teachers. For anyone looking into working as an educator, I would highly recommend it. Everyone from staff to students to employers of alumni have nothing but good things to say about the program. 

The problem is not that I realized that I do not want to be a teacher. The problem is that, as a part of my Ed Studies minor, I took Exceptionality: Introduction to Special Education; and between that course and my experience working as an ABA therapist, I fell in love with special education and realized that I would be happier in that field of education.

As of right now, there is not special education certification through the MAT program, partially because there is not a separate special education minor. There is talk of adding the coursework necessary for this (you may remember filling out an interest survey a few semesters ago). Some new topics classes related to the field have been added (Topics in Behavior Related Disorders and Learning Disabilities, both offered by Dr. Koch in the spring). However, this is a process, and although it may all come to fruition someday, a full-fledged special education program will not be available at SMCM in time for a senior such as myself to take advantage of it. 

With only three days left in Ireland, I wanted to share some of my experiences abroad and how they have shaped my future plans.

Firstly, the education system in Ireland is so different than it is in America. The University, besides having 10x the enrollment of SMCM, was also heavily research-based. The classes I took were in giant lecture halls, with very little discussion. Although it was not my preference (and definitely not what I was used to) I think the change of pace made me a more well-rounded student. The grading system was also vastly different. Though I found the professors to be relatively strict graders, a passing grade is only 40%! A ‘C’ is also officially considered a “good” grade by the University, whereas a ‘C’ often represents “average” in America. My classes were all very interesting.  One of my courses focused almost entirely on Autism Spectrum Disorder. Taking this class immediately after taking Exceptionality last semester at SMCM has left me very interested in the field of special education.

After making friends who had grown up in Ireland, I learned how different their elementary/secondary education system is from ours as well. There are very few public, coeducational schools in Ireland. The majority are either single sex, Catholic, or both. I wondered about the social implications of this, especially as Ireland is starting to move away from its more traditional Catholic roots, and LGBTQ rights referendums are soon to be voted on.  

I have finally made it to Costa Rica. It was a LONG day, but over all a good and fairly easy one. Our flight plan was a two hour plane ride to Atlanta, then a 7 hour layover before our 4 hour flight to Costa Rica! The first flight out of Baltimore left at 8:45 am. That meant I left my house at 5:30 to get to the Baltimore Washington International Airport at 6:30, about an hour and a half before boarding started. My parents were not thrilled about that! We managed to leave the house on time and make it to the airport in time to meet Leila. Leila and I had both checked into the flight before we got to the airport, so all we had to do was drop our checked bags off. I then said goodbye to my parents for six weeks, I think that is the longest I have gone without seeing them! Leila and I made it through security without incident. The line was surprisingly short and we made it through in about 10 minutes. Then we had lots of time to kill before it was time for our flight. We got breakfast sandwiches and just hung out in our terminal until it was time to go.

When we boarded the plane, we were both extremely excited to start our journey to Costa Rica! Leila had the window seat and we both looked out the window and tried to identify everything we were flying over. We both realized we needed to work on our East Coast geography! We couldn’t figure out where we were from the minute we took off. We made it through the rest of the flight uneventfully; we hit no turbulence and landed safely at the Hartsfield Jackson Atlanta International Airport at 10:45 a.m.

Then it was time to start our 7 hour layover. First we were afraid that they were going to take our bags off of the first plane and make us check them again, so we went and checked the baggage carousel for our luggage and when it wasn’t there we went off for our Atlanta Adventure. The first thing on the list was lunch at an unknown location, then the World of Coca-Cola. The first thing we had to do was find the MARTA (Atlanta’s version of the Metro). I asked a security guard where the Metro was and got a really weird look before pointing me in the right direction. I guess Metro is really only a Maryland thing. When we got into the MARTA station there was someone on the overhead speaker telling us the red line was closed. Of course that was the line we needed. WE asked a security guard what to do and he said that the yellow line ran alongside the red line for the entire time we would need so we could take that instead. We found out that in Atlanta the trains leave and arrive at specified times, we had just missed on train, the next came into the station soon after, but we had to wait 20 minutes before it was time for that train to leave. We used this time to figure out where we wanted to go for lunch. We decided on a bar-b-que restaurant named Twin Smokers, had get the real Southern food before we left the US. It was delicious. We both had pulled pork sandwiches and had to sample all of the BBQ sauces in the place before we could settle on one. I also had mashed sweet potatoes and our meals both came with pork rinds. The entire thing was delicious and fairly cheap. I would definitely recommend going there if you are ever in Downtown Atlanta!

When we had finished lunch, we made our way over to the World of Coca-Cola. We bought our tickets and went into this holding room while we waited for the guided part of the tour to start. Our tour guide took us into a room off of the waiting area with all sorts of Coke memorabilia and told us a little bit about the history of Coca-Cola. She then led us into a theater where we watched an inspirational video featuring Coca-Cola. Then we were set free to explore the rest of the museum. Of course our first stop was the tasting room! There were different flavors of Coke from all over the world that we were able to sample. Here Leila and I discovered that we have very different tastes, she likes the very sweet juice like sodas, and I like the more spice flavor soda. The soda that we agreed on the most was the Beverly, and we decided that was AWFUL! It is a soda sold in Italy that is meant to aid in digestion between meals and courses. It tasted like you had taken a root from a tree and liquefied it. It was awful, but it was lots of fun to watch people who had not tried it before make awful faces when they did. Leila and I could not believe that people actually drank Beverly in Italy, so we looked it up and found out that it is no long made, but many reviews we read said that it is an acquired taste that almost no one likes at first because of its bitter quality. There was one flavor from Costa Rica that we had to try! It was a flavor of Fanta called Kolita that was very sweet but good. I will have to see how it compares to the real stuff in Costa Rica. On our way out of the tasting room we got a free glass bottle of Coke. After the tasting room we wanted to go get our picture taken with the polar bear, but we didn’t realize the way we left the tasting room was the way to exit. So we started to make our way back to the airport before realizing that we couldn’t take the Cokes on the plane. Our first real challenge was opening the glass bottle without a bottle opener and without damaging the bottles. We drank the Cokes and saved the bottles as souvenirs.

Getting back to the airport was easy enough, but getting through the airport was more of a challenge. There were signs for where to go for domestic flights all over the place, but no signs for international flights. A security guard finally pointed us in the right direction and we made it through security once again without incident. Although my hands were tested for bomb residue, it was negative just in case you were worried. Then we managed to find our gate which was in a wing of the airport with lots of other international flights. We got dinner to eat on the plane, and saw the Brazilian women’s national swimming team. Then there was a lot more sitting and waiting. The flight was slightly late boarding, but somehow we managed to take off on time. On the flight we got customs cards to fill out, thankfully they were translated into English, although they were still surprisingly hard to fill out and we had quite a few questions about how to complete them appropriately. We weren’t stopped at customs though, so we must have done it right! On the flight we were given a light snack that consisted of a turkey and cheese sandwich with a blondie bar. It was okay, pretty dry, but not awful. We got to watch sunset through the plane window, and I even managed to sleep a bit. We landed at the Juan Santa Maria International Airport at 8 o’clock local time which is 10 p.m. in Maryland.

We managed our way through customs. I didn’t know much about where I was staying other than it was in the city of San Jose, so at customs when they asked where I was visiting I told them San Jose and they didn’t seem to like that answer, but they let me through anyways. Leila and I picked up our baggage, mine came out right away, but hers took a while and we were both scared that it hadn’t made the flight! Eventually it did come and we made our way out of the airport. There were tons of taxi drivers offering rides and it was just as overwhelming as ICADS had fore warned us. I put on my determined face and was on a mission to get to the payphones where the ICADS driver was supposed to be waiting. Along the way, Leila luckily found our driver who I just breezed past.