History of True ABAlities
Although True ABAliities Preparatory School is still relatively young in its current form, it results from TAPS Founder and Director Lauren Brennan Womble’s commitment and perseverance to her vision and calling.
Lauren began working in a neurodiverse preschool as the lead teacher, using the Reggio Emilia approach, at the Jewish Community Center in Richmond, VA. Her next position was at the Dominion School for Autism in Richmond, which provided clinical services for learners who were pushed into a “typical preschool” part day.
Lauren piloted a program for eight students (1/2 were non-communicative) at Pemberton Elementary School. The program placed neurodivergent students into classes based on their language abilities instead of by age. This challenging pilot program pushed Lauren to harness her extensive experience as an inclusion specialist to find solutions to better meet her non-verbal students’ needs.
As a result, Lauren was trained and certified in the Picture Exchange Communication System (PECS) and worked with the school speech and language pathologist (SLP) to implement PECS with four of her students that year. It was a huge success and life-changing for these students as they communicated with others for the first-time using ABA-based techniques and the PECS protocol. The program doubled in size the following year and continued to flourish in helping non-verbal and non-communicative students achieve life-changing results.
Lauren moved her family back to North Carolina (where she was born and raised) and re-created the functional communication program at a small private school locally and taught social skills to students between the ages of 4 and 18.
She was introduced to the Pyramid Educational Approach at this school. The program is based on a functional application of ABA and was designed to apply to students with various needs. Lauren observed The Pyramid Approach in certified classrooms nationwide and saw students thriving on a path towards lifelong success, so she spent years training so that she could open her own accredited school in the Pyramid Educational Approach.
In 2018, Lauren founded True ABAlities Learning Academy to allow students to participate in a program that focuses on long-term goals that any person deserves, such as independent living, community participation, and employability.
In 2022, Lauren created the Womble Institute for Neurodiversity, Inc, a 501(c)3 charity, which does business under the name True ABAlities Preparatory School.