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    Autism Center to Expand Its Family Programs


     
     
    Robert Sifuentes, seated, from the California State Council on Developmental Disabilities, presents the UCSB autism center with a new grant. Standing behind him, from left, are Assemblywoman Hannah-Beth Jackson; Gabriella Frederick, representing state Sen. Jack O'Connell; Lynn Kern Koegel, director of clinical services; Robert Koegel, center director; and Bill McLain, Tri-Counties Regional Center Representative.
    UCSB's nationally renowned Autism Research and Training Center at the Gevirtz Graduate School of Education has received a state grant of nearly $100,000 to expand its existing treatment and support services for families with children afflicted by Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASD).
    The one-year planning grant also increases the center's clinical outreach by allowing it to recruit and train undergraduate students for the first time, according to Director Robert Koegel. Currently, a handful of GGSE graduate students in the autism specialty work with families. "This will significantly expand the quality and intensity of intervention and support for families" in the center's programs, said Koegel.
    ASD is a spectrum of developmental problems, rather than a specific abnormal behavior, and it varies widely among individuals.
    The number of children diagnosed with ASD has increased tenfold in the last decade, according to Lynn Koegel, clinical services director. Finding the resources needed to help a child with ASD can be among the family's greatest frustrations, she added. The clinic maximizes the effects of positive interventions by working with families, training them to use and reinforce the techniques that work best for their children, and educating parents to provide consistent treatment.
    The autism center is the national leader in using positive interventions to develop appropriate behavior in children with ASD, rather than simply trying to discourage problem activities. The Autism Research Clinic was recently named as one of the top 10 comprehensive autism educational training facilities in the country by the National Research Council of the National Academy of Sciences.