Meet Our Team: Clinical

Founder, CEO

Raajna Naidu

The founder of IABAS For Families, Raajna Naidu, is a Board Certified Behavior Analyst (BCBA) and Clinical Director at IABAS For Families. She holds a Bachelor’s Degree in Psychology and a Master’s Degree in Education with an emphasis on Equity and Social Justice from San Francisco State University. In 2016, Raajna earned her Master’s in Education with an Emphasis in Applied Behavioral Analysis from Arizona State University.

As a parent, she wanted to start an ABA agency that ensured families got access to adequate clinical support from their provider that focused on parent training, parent resources, and barriers that may affect parents from participating in direct therapy sessions weekly. In 2019, she turned her dream into reality by starting her own ABA agency. Her goal was to support families seeking ABA services for their loved ones and address language and cultural factors that affect service delivery when serving diverse populations.

She created a model for parent training that allows parents to get trained on principles of ABA, using behavioral skills training, targeting goals outside of sessions heavily focused on communication and independent living skills for the clients we serve.

In addition, Raajna ensures that at IABAS for Families, clinicians have access to resources such as ongoing materials required for effective service delivery with every client we serve.

On the other hand, Raajna values family, integrity, innovation, and teamwork and is very passionate about gender equality and access to quality education for children. With this passion, she is working on projects that would benefit children in the Bay area community.

Board Certified Behavior Analyst

Summer Rodriguez

Summer Rodriguez is a Board Certified Behavior Analyst (BCBA) at IABAS For Families. She is responsible for managing the Monterey/Salinas region, where she provides supervision to program supervisors, behavior technicians, and training to families whose children are diagnosed with Autism. For seven years, Summer has worked in the ABA field and has 13 years of experience working with children ages 18 months to 22 years old. She holds a Bachelor’s degree in Behavioral Science and Psychology and a Master’s degree in Applied Behavior Analysis. Summer enjoys training families and employees to understand ABA terms using real-life examples common in everyday life. She feels that every day is filled with new opportunities and ways to help children learn. Small victories and daily celebrations, even the most minor achievements, motivate Summer to stay in the ABA field. Her interest is to work with deaf and hard-of-hearing children, learn ASL, and learn how to do ABA therapy through sign language. Moreover, Summer enjoys spending time with her family, playing card games, having barbeques on the beach, and loves to eat Mexican food during her free time.

Board Certified Behavior Analyst

Raquel Rios

Raquel Rios is a Board Certified Behavior Analyst (BCBA) at IABAS For Families. She was born and raised in the San Francisco Bay Area. She received her Bachelor’s degree in Psychology from San Francisco State University, then decided to join the ABA field as a behavior technician. Shortly after joining the field, she decided to pursue a career as a behavior analyst and enrolled at Ball State University, where she received her Master’s degree in ABA.

In October 2020, she became a BCBA and focused on providing families with the tools and skills needed in order to help their children thrive, as well as overseeing program supervisors and behavior technicians who work directly with individuals diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder or other developmental disabilities.

Raquel is bilingual in English and Spanish and works primarily with the Spanish-speaking community through telehealth. She is passionate about providing culturally competent services and ensuring her clients and their families feel heard and respected.

Raquel enjoys spending time with her two children, husband, and cat. She loves reading, watching movies, playing board games, and singing silly songs to make her kids laugh.

telehealth BCBA

Tamsin Mcewen-Asker

Tamsin works in the role of telehealth BCBA in the San Joaquin region. She began to hone her use of ABA behavior strategies in 2013 while leading playful learning sessions. She studied at the Florida Institute of Technology where her interests were catalyzed toward a broad application of behavior change to everyday life.

While learning never stops, the process is an important step toward achieving results. She considers it an achievement when the learner is engaged and the team is collaborating with the family to bring about a satisfactory day. For some families, this might involve leaning towards a challenge to practice communication, while for another family it might be a priority to reduce friction. Each situation is unique and so Tamsin asks questions to gather information. She is handy to bounce ideas back and forth and to show others the benefits of ABA techniques.

Behavioral science offers an effective framework to approach a variety of situations, but Tamsin is most interested in building interactive routines, simplifying situations, and carefully noticing the surroundings. She enjoys helping others view the world objectively through the lens of ABA, making ABA accessible. She aims to teach behavior skills naturalistically in pace with the learner’s motivations. At the same time, she looks to ensure services are compassionate and trauma-informed. In short, she believes participant engagement in services is obtained through volition not coercion. In other words, participation should be a relaxed and joyful experience.

Outside of work, Tamsin hopes to get a bumper crop of tomatoes from her garden this year. She enjoys playing endless board games with her family during the holidays. She also savors the daily ritual of sipping hot coffee and tea, whatever the weather.

Board-Certified Behavior Analyst

Barbara Farag

Barbara Farag is a Board-Certified Behavior Analyst. Barbara Farag joined IABAS as an Assessor. Barbara has been in the field of ABA since 2012. While her expertise includes working with adolescents and challenging behaviors, Barbara has worked with all ages ranging from 2-65 years old, and across a variety of settings, including as a special education teacher for two years. Barbara was studying to become a lawyer, until she gained a job in ABA as a behavior interventionist and fell in love with the field. Barbara continued to gain her degree in ABA and obtained her Masters in 2014. When not working, Barbara enjoys hanging out with her husband and two children.

Chief Growth Officer

Puja Chocha

Puja Chocha is the Chief Growth Officer for IABAS for Families and a Board-Certified Behavior Analyst with over 15 years of experience in behavioral healthcare. Puja is passionate about witnessing the growth of clients, teams, and organizations. Prior to joining IABAS for Families, Puja worked as an ABA Director for two nationwide ABA providers. Her unique combination of clinical and growth skills has resulted in a track record of developing dynamic, high-performing teams that prioritize connection, servant leadership, and exceptional attention to client and provider experience. Puja’s motivation comes from doing good work with good people.

Puja earned an MS in Clinical Psychology from California Lutheran University. She is a lifelong learner who enjoys expanding her knowledge by taking classes and reading when she’s not hiking, biking, or practicing yoga.