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An experienced special education teacher, it just seemed natural to Connie Hebert to respond to the increasing number of youngsters diagnosed with autism.
Now Hebert, Cape Girardeau, Mo., formerly of Pittsburg, is founding director of the Southeast Missouri State University Autism Center for Diagnosis and Treatment.
“That’s quite a mouthful,” Hebert said Tuesday in a telephone interview.
But she noted that the center provides a wide range of services, ranging from diagnostic evaluation and assessment to individual and group therapies and other treatment activities.
“We also help train students to become future professionals who will work with individuals on the autism spectrum,” Hebert added. “This is still a very new program, and we’re experiencing a lot of growth.”
The fourth such center in Missouri, it is housed in a $2.6 million facility. Hebert was among those wielding shovels when the ground was broken on Jan. 23, 2009.
The daughter of Ron and Virginia Smith, Pittsburg, she is a 1985 Pittsburg High School graduate and a 1989 graduate of Pittsburg State University with a bachelor’s degree in elementary and special education from Pittsburg State University. She also earned a master’s degree in special education from Pennsylvania State University, State College, Pa., and has completed coursework and requirements for serving as a psychological examiner in Missouri.
Hebert began her career as a special education teacher serving students with learning disabilities, cognitive disabilities, autism spectrum disorder and emotional disturbance in kindergarten through 12th grade.
“I don’t know that I chose autism,” Hebert said. “I had been a special education teacher for most of my career, and in the mid-1990s, when autism became a hot topic, I got some training. I didn’t start out to seek this field, just saw there was a need and it led me to this.”
She explained that autism is not one disorder, but many.
“It’s kind of amazing what we’re learning over the past few years,” Hebert said. “Autism spectrum disorder can look so many different ways in every child. Every individual is unique.”
Before moving to Missouri, she and her family lived in central Pennsylvania where she was a special education teacher and then special education consultant for behavior and autism in the central region of Pennsylvania. She was then a special education improvement consultant for the southeast region of Missouri and in 2005 was named Missouri Staff Developer of the Year for her extensive work in systems level data analysis with districts in southeast Missouri.
An experienced special education teacher, it just seemed natural to Connie Hebert to respond to the increasing number of youngsters diagnosed with autism.
Now Hebert, Cape Girardeau, Mo., formerly of Pittsburg, is founding director of the Southeast Missouri State University Autism Center for Diagnosis and Treatment.
“That’s quite a mouthful,” Hebert said Tuesday in a telephone interview.
But she noted that the center provides a wide range of services, ranging from diagnostic evaluation and assessment to individual and group therapies and other treatment activities.
“We also help train students to become future professionals who will work with individuals on the autism spectrum,” Hebert added. “This is still a very new program, and we’re experiencing a lot of growth.”
The fourth such center in Missouri, it is housed in a $2.6 million facility. Hebert was among those wielding shovels when the ground was broken on Jan. 23, 2009.
The daughter of Ron and Virginia Smith, Pittsburg, she is a 1985 Pittsburg High School graduate and a 1989 graduate of Pittsburg State University with a bachelor’s degree in elementary and special education from Pittsburg State University. She also earned a master’s degree in special education from Pennsylvania State University, State College, Pa., and has completed coursework and requirements for serving as a psychological examiner in Missouri.
Hebert began her career as a special education teacher serving students with learning disabilities, cognitive disabilities, autism spectrum disorder and emotional disturbance in kindergarten through 12th grade.
“I don’t know that I chose autism,” Hebert said. “I had been a special education teacher for most of my career, and in the mid-1990s, when autism became a hot topic, I got some training. I didn’t start out to seek this field, just saw there was a need and it led me to this.”
She explained that autism is not one disorder, but many.
“It’s kind of amazing what we’re learning over the past few years,” Hebert said. “Autism spectrum disorder can look so many different ways in every child. Every individual is unique.”
Before moving to Missouri, she and her family lived in central Pennsylvania where she was a special education teacher and then special education consultant for behavior and autism in the central region of Pennsylvania. She was then a special education improvement consultant for the southeast region of Missouri and in 2005 was named Missouri Staff Developer of the Year for her extensive work in systems level data analysis with districts in southeast Missouri.
Hebert, who has also had her own consulting business, is also co-author with Victoria Bernhardt of “Response to Intervention and Continuous School Improvement: Using Data, Vision and Leadership to Design, Implement and Evaluate a Schoolwide Prevention Program.”
“It’s my first publication, and I’m very excited about it,” Hebert said.
RTI includes a multi-level prevention system designed to address the learning needs of all students with intervention provided as each student demonstrates a need.
One of the points of RTI is that early intervention is crucial to keep problems from growing and becoming worse.
That’s certainly true in the case of autism, according to Hebert.
“There can be a good prognosis, but it’s very important for youngsters with autism spectrum disorder to be diagnosed early so that treatment can start as soon as possible,” she said.
