06/12/2018
Meet Ashley Faust M.A., ECSE, director of LEAPS Academy Inc. and LEAPS Therapeutic Clinic.
In 1999, I graduated from UAB with an undergraduate degree in social psychology and psychology along with a minor in social work. I continued with my education at UAB and received my Master’s degree in Early Childhood Special Education in 2002. While being overseen by Dr. James Partington as his first long distance therapist, I learned how to write and implement verbal behavior programs for children with developmental delays, language delays, and behavioral concerns. I trained as an infant massage therapist and worked with at-risk infants in Children’s Hospital NICU and written and received a federal grant to provide preschool services to the Pell City School system for at-risk preschool children.
For the past 18 years, I have served children in Central Alabama privately and through multiple school districts (Pell City Schools, Mountain Brook Schools, Shelby County Schools, Hoover City Schools, Clay County Schools, and others) by providing direct instruction in a variety of settings, teacher in-service, training, and parent training. I was responsible for writing individual programs for all clients and directing multi-disciplinary staff on how to treat individuals with a variety of disabilities.
Opening in 2010, I founded LEAPS Academy Inc as a small special needs program for students ages 5-10. As my family grew, so did my desire to expand our program to offer early intervention services, preschool classes, and an upper grade school. LEAPS Academy is a preschool play based academic program which offers services to children of all abilities, and allows my staff and me to continue our mission of helping children with developmental disabilities reach their highest potential. After several years of operation and request from parents, LEAPS Academy became a private school welcoming children to stay and grow with us long term.
During this transition to a private school, it became obvious we were missing a big piece of the puzzle in treating the whole child. In order to help our students reach their full potential, we needed to bring in therapists that are like minded to provide speech and occupational therapy, along with other therapeutic services. LEAPS Therapeutic Clinic was founded to offer these services to our students and our community. I’m thrilled to be able to work with these unique, amazing ladies and blend all of our experiences together. It’s exciting to see our center grow and I’m excited to share this with everyone!
Working with children and families with developmental disabilities has been my life long passion. As a child, I even had an interest. From teaching swim lessons for exceptional children, to being the first in a group of “baseball buddies” in an exceptional league (before it really even existed), to helping a peer in high school, to being a nanny for multiple children with disabilities, to my own god son, this is who I’m supposed to be. In my free time you’ll find me hanging out with my three amazing children and my high school sweet heart!
