Dinorah Salinas

When Dinorah Salinas, a Developmental Evaluator for the Milestones program at Tennessee Tech University, first entered the teaching field, she felt there was more she could do.

“When I was doing my undergrad [at Tech], my goal was to become a teacher,” Salinas said. “For my student teaching, I was placed in a neurotypical classroom.”

Her position was in a setting where young students performed in a conventional way, but down the hall, in another class, she heard something different going on. The teachers in that classroom were giving individual, step-by-step instructions to their students. When Salinas asked the teacher she was helping what was going on in there, she was told it was their behavior classroom.

At the time, Salinas’s nephew was undergoing evaluation at Vanderbilt Children’s Hospital due to some behavioral issues. Salinas’s family suspected he might be on the Autism spectrum, but they weren’t sure.

When she went into the behavior classroom, Salinas discovered that every child in the class was neurodivergent. From Autism to ADHD, and some with comorbidities (two different conditions that occur at the same time), the children in this classroom needed one-on-one attention.

“I went into the classroom, and it was like, that's what I was meant to do,” Salinas said. “I felt like I was needed.”

After her experience student teaching as an undergraduate at Tech, Salinas worked part-time as the Interpreter Coordinator for Cookeville Regional Medical Center. She saw children in occupational, speech and physical therapy, which prompted her to consider a career somewhere between the field of health and the field of education.

She ended up finding ABA, Applied Behavioral Analysis.

"One of my old professors from my undergrad studies sent out an email stating there was a new [grad] program that was coming out,” Salinas said.

The Applied Behavioral Analysis program at Tech was fairly new, with only eight or nine students enrolled. After meeting with the professor on Zoom, Salinas learned that the program was about providing one-on-one support for kids that need extra guidance, whether at school, at home or in the community.

After getting accepted into the program, Salinas fulfilled required clinical hours at a company called Positive Behavior Supports. It was here she shifted her focus to providing behavioral therapy to young children.  

She felt this was what she was meant to do.

She wanted to raise awareness about neurodivergent diagnoses in young children. Some behavior that children exhibit between the ages of 3 to 5 are sometimes written up as a “stage” they will eventually grow out of. Because of this, early signs of neurodivergent behavior can often be overlooked.  

“Whenever they were in the school system,” Salinas said, “I always wondered, how long did it take for the parents to realize?”

For many of the children Salinas was assigned to help, they had only received therapy or other necessary services for a year, six months, or even less. Salinas contemplated what assistance the child received prior to those six months, prior to that year.

During this time, Salinas’s family was working tirelessly to find the right services for her nephew, who had been diagnosed with Autism, but they kept hitting snags.  

“They were right in that age gap where he was too young to start school with all the support that he needed, but too old to be in the early intervention field,” she said.

While researching the best way she could help her nephew and family, Salinas realized that many parents simply didn’t have these resources made available to them. How can a parent recognize neurodivergent behavior in their child if they don’t know what to look for to begin with?

This sparked another interest within Salinas.

“We have to do better as a society, and as professionals in the education field,” Salinas said.

Now, Salinas works for Milestones, a program under Tennessee Tech’s College of Education and Human Sciences, as a developmental evaluator for children from birth to 3 years old. Typically, Salinas is provided with referrals from pediatricians, primary care physicians, the Department of Children’s Services, and sometimes local daycares or preschool teachers who have raised concerns. The referral can mention anything from the neurological (a possible delay in a child’s speech development), to the physical (trouble lifting a specific arm).

After receiving a referral, Salinas contacts the family to discuss the child’s development, and offers to assess them.

“Nine times out of ten,” she said, “the families will be very welcoming.”

Often, parents have already noticed non-typical behavior, and have concerns of their own regarding the development of their child. Salinas listens to these concerns, and administers an assessment test called the Battelle Developmental Inventory (BDI-3).

One motivating factor for Salinas’s desire to work with non-neurotypical children and their families comes from an experience she had at Capshaw Elementary School, in the heart of Cookeville.

“Ever since I was little,” she said, “I knew I wanted to be in education. I had this teacher in second grade at Capshaw. Her name was Ms. Weinrock, and she really impacted my life.” Salinas’s teacher was the only person in the school who spoke Spanish. “For my parents, being non-English speakers, it opened a whole door to them.”

Having a teacher to talk to about their child, someone who they could communicate with, made a world of difference for Salinas’s family.  

“I was so young, and I can still remember seeing my parents’ faces when they saw my teacher. It looked like a weight was lifted off their shoulders.”

Much of this childhood experience is reflected in what Salinas does today. As the only Spanish-speaking evaluator in the Milestones program, she’s often sent Spanish-speaking referrals. Rather than going through an interpreter or translator, Salinas feels that parents are more comfortable speaking directly to an evaluator.

“I always knew I wanted to help families in that aspect,” Salinas said, “because I know how hard it is. And especially, especially the bilingual aspect. So my favorite part is helping out those Spanish-speaking families who may not have all these resources available to them. I feel like I help bridge that gap.”

When asked about choosing Tennessee Tech for both her undergraduate and graduate studies, Salinas smiled and said, “My roots are here.”

Originally from Los Herreras, a town in Nuevo Leon, Mexico, Salinas’s family moved to Cookeville when she was six years old. Growing up, Salinas and her family didn’t have a lot of means. Her parents worked difficult schedules, but any time they had off, they would take her to Tech’s campus to run around the track, or play hide-and-seek.

“Ever since then,” Salinas said, “my parents would always tell me get ready, because in a couple years you're going to be going here.”

The decision to attend Tennessee Tech was a natural step for Salinas.

“So I came here, and I've loved it ever since. I mean, it did not disappoint. It literally and figuratively gave me wings. Like, I swear. I swear.”