Faculty members in The University of Alabama in Huntsville (UAH) College of Education, Sport, and Human Sciences (CESHS) – left to right, Dr. Beth Quick, dean; Dr. Jennifer Bruzek, assistant professor; Dr. Laura Senn, clinical assistant professor, and Dr. Jeremy Elliott, associate dean and associate professor – have much to celebrate in 2025. Two highlights from the Master of Science in Applied Behavior Analysis program stand out: 100% first-time pass rate for graduates who took the Board Certified Behavior Analyst exam in 2024 and Tier 2A recognition from the Association for Behavior Analysis International’s Tiered Model of Education.
Michael Mercier | UAH
The Master of Science in Applied Behavior Analysis (ABA) at The University of Alabama in Huntsville (UAH) has reached a milestone achievement. All program graduates who took the Board Certified Behavior Analyst (BCBA) examination for the first time in 2024 passed. That makes UAH one of only 11 out of 192 universities to meet the 100% pass rate for first-time candidates, according to the report released earlier this year by the Behavior Analyst Certification Board.
“It’s an incredibly rigorous exam to pass,” said Dr. Jennifer Bruzek, assistant professor, Department of Curriculum and Instruction, College of Education, Sport, and Human Sciences at UAH, a part of The University of Alabama System. “The national average pass rate for first-time candidates is only 54% of almost 10,000 first-time test-takers.”
The 100% pass rate isn’t the program’s only major accomplishment this year. Bruzek and fellow ABA instructor Dr. Laura Senn, clinical assistant professor, pursued recognition through the Association for Behavior Analysis International’s (ABAI) Tiered Model of Education. They recently achieved Tier 2A.
“This recognition is particularly meaningful because it represents an important step toward full accreditation for our program,” Bruzek said. “ABAI, one of only two accrediting bodies for behavior analysis programs, and the oldest in the field, sets rigorous standards that guide the growth and quality of programs worldwide.”
“The college is proud to celebrate its ABA candidates’ strong pass rate on the BCBA exam and its achievement of Tier 2A recognition,” said Dr. Beth Quick, dean, College of Education, Sport, and Human Sciences. “This was made possible through the exceptional leadership, expertise and commitment of Drs. Bruzek and Senn. This accomplishment reflects the rigor of the program and the excellence of its fully online design and delivery, which prepare candidates for success and impact in the field.”
Board-certified behavior analysts assess and manage human behavior for a wide range of clients, including, but not limited to, individuals with autism, traumatic brain injuries or any type of intellectual or developmental disability as well as children in the foster care system and geriatric patients.
Organizational behavior management, a branch of behavior analysis that deals with performance management and systems, can benefit workplaces, too.
“We look at behavior from the perspective of what’s happening in the environment to either maintain, increase or decrease behavior in some way so that people are moving towards living the lives they want to live,” Bruzek said.
“Most of our students have had an undergraduate background in either psychology, education or another related field,” Senn said. “Many of them have gotten into the field at an entry level as a certified registered behavior technician (RBT).
“The roles of an RBT and a BCBA are similar to those of a nurse to a doctor. Behavior analysts oversee behavior assessments, create an individualized plan for each client, and continuously monitor ongoing data to determine progress and modify those individual plans. They also train and monitor RBTs, who are delivering the day-to-day hands-on services according to individual client plans.”
To ensure their students are ready for the BCBA exam and the vital work that follows, Bruzek and Senn employ teaching methods that model best practices in the behavior analysis field.
“We almost never teach the same class twice,” Bruzek said, “because we always try to pull out what didn’t work to replace it with a new idea to improve on the original. We take an individualized approach and monitor each student to make sure that they’re where they need to be.”
“In addition to purposefully soliciting feedback on a weekly basis from all of our students, we also turn a behavior-analytic eye toward what we’re doing,” Senn added. “We do a lot of self-assessment. How well did something achieve the effect we intended? What could be adjusted to produce a better outcome next time?
“This is exactly what we do in this field overall. We really utilize the techniques and the principles that our students are taught in the program to keep the program going and make it better year after year.”
Interested in obtaining your BCBA certification? Visit the M.S. in ABA page on the UAH website.