Amy Wiech, M.Ed., BCBA, earned a Bachelors of Science in Special Education from University of Maryland , College Park in 1995 with an emphasis in Early Childhood Education, ages 0-8. Ms. Wiech had the opportunity to be instructed and mentored by Andrew Egel, Paula Beckman, Joan Leiber, Steve Graham, Michael Pressley, Beth Harry, and other well published researchers in the field of special education. Ms. Wiech continued her education at University of Hawaii where she earned a Masters of Education in Special Education with an emphasis on Autism Spectrum Disorders and Applied Behavior Analysis (ABA), where her thesis examined siblings of children with Autism using the ‘Sibshops' approach.

•  She became a Board Certified Behavior Analyst (BCBA) in June 2004. She has worked extensively since 1993 as an ABA therapist/consultant and special education teacher for many children with autism and their families. She has worked with children who are beginner learners, intermediate learners, as well as advanced learners.

•  Ms. Wiech is strongly influenced by the work of B.F. Skinner, Jack Michael, Mark Sundberg, Jim Partington, Vince Carbone, Ali Moors and Michael Fabrizio in the field of Behavior Analysis.

•  Professional memberships include the national Association for Behavior Analysis (ABA), Autism Society of Hawaii (ASH), the Hawaii Association for Behavior Analysis (HABA), Council for Exceptional Children (CEC), The Association for Persons with Severe Handicaps (TASH). Since 1995, Ms. Wiech has also provided support to young children with autism in their regular education and special education classrooms.  During her dozen years working in the field of autism, Ms. Wiech has provided a hundreds of individualized trainings for parents, teachers and support staff such as Department of Education, Easter Seals, Department of Health agencies, focusing on providing behavior analytic services in inclusive settings, and other topics pertaining to autism. Ms. Wiech has trained hundreds of support personnel on autism, and ABA topics. Ms. Wiech was not only providing direct intervention to children with autism and their families, but also developing individualized programs for the children she served and training and supervising home trainers in program implementation. Ms. Wiech has also had the opportunity to participate in the recovery and loss of diagnosis for a number of her clients, who are now indistinguishable from their peers. 

•  Currently, Ms. Wiech is a candidate for a Ph.D. (2007) in Education at University of Hawaii , specifically Exceptionalities/Special Education, focusing on Autism and specializing in Multiculturalism. Areas of research include: Early Intensive Behavior Intervention (EIBI), Verbal Behavior (VB), Theory of Mind (TOM), social cognition, ABA and Positive Behavior Support (PBS), making and keeping friends, Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) special education law including Least Restrictive Environment (LRE) and Free Appropriate Public Education (FAPE), and functional communication training (FCT). Ms. Wiech has narrowed her dissertation research to targeting the intervention of Circle of Friends on children with Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASD). Her mentors and advisors include Mary Jo Noonan and Dennis McDougall in the field of Applied Behavior Analysis.