Community Integration

Ability Training Services focuses on community integration skill building through our Skill Training and Activities Program, also referred to as STAP. 

The STAP program occurs in the community during regularly occurring, organized, scheduled, intentional and structured social activities. The STAP program can be administered both one-to-one (individually) or in groups (small and large).

Our STAP program provides supports including but not limited to, the following:

• Community participation support (avoiding isolation, opportunity for socialization in places where an individual’s interest, culture, talent, and gifts can be contributed and shared with others with similar interests)
• Self-awareness support (respecting personal space, volume, odor, movements/gestures)
• Self-control support (compromising in a group decision, waiting your place in line)
• Self-advocacy 
• Expressive communication support (age appropriate conversation topics, initiating engagement with others)
• Receptive communication support (taking turns in a conversation, listening, understanding information, recall)
• Non-verbal communication support (appropriate eye contact, posture, gestures)
• Social responsiveness support (recognizing hazards or unsafe situations in the community, “stranger danger”)
• Social amenities support (recognizing the end of an engagement)
• Interpersonal skills support (appropriate behavior near certain groups, coping with social anxiety, build and strengthen relationships)
• Coordinating personal time and location/navigation (using watches, phones, computers, clocks, maps, street signs, calendars, bus schedules, community landmarks, signage & symbols, alarms)
• Social planning (help develop the skills needed to discover, initiate, plan and engage in new, interesting, and enjoyable activities as well as in things that involve the broader community)
• Support to participate in clubs, association, and organizations (as members and in decision-making capacity)

ATS participants receive a calendar of events each month from which they can choose specific activities to participate in. Each involve community integration and specific skill building.