Bachelor of Arts - Applied Behaviour Analysis - Autism

The Bachelor of Arts in Applied Behaviour Analysis - Autism is a four-year degree with practicum, and one of the few Canadian undergraduate programs dedicated specifically to ABA and autism intervention.

Students take a psychology foundation — developmental psychology, learning theory, research methods and statistics, abnormal psychology — then move into the specialism: principles of applied behaviour analysis, single-subject research design, functional behaviour assessment, behaviour intervention planning, verbal behaviour and language acquisition, early intensive behavioural intervention, ethics and professional conduct in behaviour analysis, and family and team collaboration. Supervised practicum placements provide direct intervention hours with clients.

The employment case is unusually concrete. Demand for qualified behaviour interventionists in British Columbia consistently exceeds supply, funded autism intervention creates a stable service market, and the coursework is oriented toward the educational requirements for behaviour analyst certification — so graduates enter with both employability and a defined professional ladder rather than a general psychology credential.

CapU is a fully public teaching university on Vancouver’s North Shore — a Designated Learning Institution (DLI O19280078102) with university status since 2008. Classes are small, faculty teach rather than delegate to assistants, and tuition sits well below the big Vancouver research universities while the credential carries the same public-institution standing.

Its field maps to CIP 42.2814 (Applied behaviour analysis). As a bachelor’s degree, graduates are exempt from the November 2024 PGWP field-of-study restriction and may qualify for a Post-Graduation Work Permit of up to three years. Full-time on-campus study and graduation remain the conditions, and final decisions rest with IRCC.