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Milwaukee City Guide

ABA Programs in Milwaukee

Wisconsin licensed behavior analysts in 2010, earlier than most states, and has no active in-state master's degree in the subject. That gap is the defining fact about training here — and it sits alongside one of the highest entry-level pay floors of any metro in this guide. This page covers both, and the online certificate UW-Milwaukee runs in the middle of them.

Programs in metro
1 verified in the Milwaukee metro
ABAI-accredited
0 of the institutions in this metro
License required
Yes in Wisconsin — see the state guide
Metro median
$61,960 for SOC 21-1018, Milwaukee-Waukesha, WI

Key Takeaways

  • 01Wisconsin has no active in-state ABA master's degree. For a state of nearly six million people that is unusual, and it means every Wisconsin student either studies online with an out-of-state university or leaves.
  • 02What Milwaukee does have is UW-Milwaukee's 22-credit Applied Behavior Analysis Graduate Certificate, delivered online at a flat $600 per credit. It satisfies the coursework requirement, not the degree requirement.
  • 03The metro's 10th percentile is $46,300 — the seventh-highest entry floor of the fifty metros on this site, above Boston, Los Angeles and Sacramento.
  • 04Cost-adjusted, the $61,960 median is worth about $63,942 nationally, the ninth-best real figure in this guide, because prices run 3.1% below the national average and housing 2.9% below.
  • 05Wisconsin licensed behavior analysts in 2010, earlier than most states — a settled regulatory framework that predates the profession's national expansion.

Milwaukee presents a puzzle worth naming directly: Wisconsin licensed behavior analysts in 2010, ahead of most of the country, and there is no active master's degree in applied behavior analysis anywhere in the state. A regulatory framework arrived and a training pipeline did not follow.

What exists in the metro is a coursework route. UW-Milwaukee runs a 22-credit Applied Behavior Analysis Graduate Certificate online at a flat $600 per credit for residents and non-residents alike. It is a certificate, so it satisfies the BACB's coursework requirement and leaves the degree requirement to a master's you hold already or take elsewhere. For someone who already has a qualifying graduate degree — a teacher, a school psychologist, a speech-language pathologist — it is a clean and inexpensive route. For someone starting from a bachelor's, it is only half the answer.

The employment side is considerably better than the education side. Milwaukee's 10th percentile of $46,300 is the seventh-highest entry floor of the fifty metros in this guide, and its cost-adjusted median of about $63,942 is ninth-best. Children's Wisconsin is a substantial pediatric system. The state's federally designated developmental disabilities center, the Waisman Center, sits eighty miles west at UW-Madison and holds a UCEDD, a LEND program and an Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities Research Center — the full set, just not in this metro.

Metro scope

Includes: Milwaukee, Waukesha, West Allis, Wauwatosa, Brookfield, New Berlin, Oak Creek, Menomonee Falls. The Milwaukee-Waukesha metro, covering Milwaukee, Waukesha, Ozaukee and Washington counties — the city and its lakefront, the western suburbs through Wauwatosa, Brookfield and Waukesha, and the northern ring into Ozaukee and Washington.
Note: Wisconsin is a single-state metro here, and its regulatory history is longer than most. Wisconsin licenses behavior analysts through the Department of Safety and Professional Services and has since 2010, which puts it among the earlier licensing states. Your BCBA is the qualifying credential and the state license is your practice authority. The relevant geography is not a border but a drive: Wisconsin's federally designated developmental disabilities center, the Waisman Center, is at UW-Madison about eighty miles west, and so is the state's LEND program. Chicago is ninety miles south in a different licensing regime, which matters if you intend to work across the Illinois line.

The programs

Every one of the BCBA routes in Milwaukee and Wisconsin

1 programs

01

University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee — Applied Behavior Analysis Graduate Certificate

UW-Milwaukee campus, east side; delivered online · Milwaukee, WI · No commute; online delivery

Tuition
$600 per credit hour, the same rate for residents and non-residents
Length
22 credits, about 2 years
Format
Online
Accreditation
BACB-qualifying coursework sequence; UWM School of Education
Part-time
Built for working professionals already holding a graduate degree
  • The only ABA offering based in Wisconsin, and the state's route to BCBA coursework
  • A flat $600 per credit for residents and non-residents alike
  • This is a certificate, not a degree: it satisfies the coursework requirement and not the degree requirement
  • The right route for a teacher, school psychologist or therapist who already holds a qualifying master's
  • If you are starting from a bachelor's degree, you need a master's as well — which in Wisconsin means online, out of state

Cost of living

What it costs to live in Milwaukee while you study

Milwaukee is inexpensive without being one of the bargain metros: the BEA index puts the whole basket 3.1% below the national average and housing 2.9% below. Combined with a median of $61,960 — the fourteenth-highest in this guide — that produces the ninth-best cost-adjusted pay of the fifty metros here. The metro is compact, lake-bounded and the transit is bus-based, which works in the city core and not much beyond it.

Housing, 2024

97.1

2.9% below the national average

Everything, 2024

96.9

3.1% below the national average

Metro median pay covers

$63,942

of national-average spending

Housing runs 2.9% below the national average, which is the single biggest reason the overall cost of living lands where it does.

Both figures are BEA Regional Price Parities for Milwaukee-Waukesha, WI, 2024, where the national average is 100. Housing is the services-housing component; the second figure is the whole basket.

Housing price level

2.9% below the national average

BEA Regional Price Parity for housing, 2024

All-items price level

3.1% below the national average

BEA Regional Price Parity, all items, 2024

Transit

MCTS bus and the Hop streetcar

Bus-based; the streetcar serves downtown only, and a four-county caseload needs a car

Car

Required for fieldwork

A four-county metro, and the state UCEDD is eighty miles west in Madison

Tuition, UW-Milwaukee certificate (all students)

$600 per credit hour

Flat rate for residents and non-residents; 22 credits

Distance to the state UCEDD

80 miles

The Waisman Center is at UW-Madison, which also holds the state LEND program and an IDDRC

Clinical fieldwork

BCBA certification in Milwaukee: where Wisconsin students do supervised fieldwork

Wisconsin concentrates its federal developmental disabilities infrastructure in Madison rather than Milwaukee: the Waisman Center at UW-Madison holds a UCEDD, a LEND program and an Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities Research Center all at once. In Milwaukee itself, the anchor is Children's Wisconsin, one of the larger independent pediatric systems in the Midwest, alongside a large city school district and a well-developed agency layer.

Children's Wisconsin

Children's Wisconsin is the state's pediatric health system, based in Wauwatosa, with developmental and behavioral health services across the metro.

Waisman Center, UW-Madison

The Waisman Center holds Wisconsin's UCEDD designation, its LEND program and an Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities Research Center. It is eighty miles west, which makes it a commute for a placement rather than a local option.

Milwaukee Public Schools and suburban districts

Milwaukee Public Schools is the state's largest district, and the Waukesha County suburbs — Brookfield, New Berlin, Menomonee Falls — run well-resourced special education programs.

Wisconsin Medicaid-funded providers

Wisconsin funds behavioral treatment for autism through Medicaid and commercial insurance, supporting an agency layer across the four-county metro.

Easterseals Southeast Wisconsin

Easterseals Southeast Wisconsin runs autism and disability services across the Milwaukee region and is among the metro's longer-established providers.

Hiring market

Major ABA employers across the Milwaukee metro

Milwaukee's pay floor is the most interesting thing about its employer market. A 10th percentile of $46,300 — seventh-highest in this guide — suggests that entry-level behavioral health roles here are better paid than in most metros, which is consistent with a market where a large children's health system, a big unionized district and an established agency layer all set reference wages. The absence of a local master's program also means fewer new graduates entering each year than a comparable metro produces.

Children's Wisconsin

Pediatric health system

The state's children's hospital system, based in Wauwatosa, with developmental and behavioral health services and a substantial behavior-analytic workforce.

Milwaukee Public Schools

Public school district

Wisconsin's largest district, employing behavior specialists across special education services with Wisconsin Retirement System membership.

Easterseals Southeast Wisconsin

Nonprofit disability services provider

Runs autism and disability services across the Milwaukee region, and one of the metro's longer-established behavior-analytic employers.

University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee

Public research university

Runs the state's only ABA coursework sequence and anchors the metro's supervision and professional network.

Wisconsin Medicaid-funded agencies

Private providers

Providers delivering behavioral treatment for autism under Wisconsin Medicaid and commercial plans across the four-county metro.

Metro pay

BCBA salary in the Milwaukee-Waukesha metro

Metro median

$61,960

National median

$59,350

10th percentile

$46,300

90th percentile

$93,180

BLS metro median, May 2025

$61,960

$2,610 above the national median

Cost of living, 2024

96.9

3.1% below the national average

Worth nationally

$63,942

the same pay in national-average dollars

Because prices run 3.1% below the national average, $61,960 here goes about as far as $63,942 would nationally.

BLS does not publish a separate occupation for behavior analysts. This is the May 2025 median for SOC 21-1018 (Substance Abuse, Behavioral Disorder, and Mental Health Counselors), the category BCBAs are counted in, which also contains counseling roles that typically pay less. Read it as a floor for the metro, not as BCBA pay. Wages: BLS Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics, Milwaukee-Waukesha, WI. Cost of living is the BEA Regional Price Parity for the metro, all items, 2024, where the national average is 100. It is the most recent year BEA publishes, so it sits one year behind the wage figure. Prices: BEA Regional Price Parities.

Salary distribution BLS OEWS · SOC 21-1018
Milwaukee pay against the national figure
10th percentile (Milwaukee)
$46,300
Milwaukee median
$61,960
National median
$59,350
90th percentile (Milwaukee)
$93,180

BCBAs are counted inside a broader occupation, so the median reads as a floor for the metro and the 90th percentile is the better guide to experienced BCBA pay.

The published figure for this metro is $61,960, the BLS OEWS May 2025 median for SOC 21-1018, Substance Abuse, Behavioral Disorder, and Mental Health Counselors, across the Milwaukee-Waukesha metro. That is $2,610 above the national median of $59,350 for the same code, and the fourteenth-highest of the fifty metros on this site. BLS publishes no separate occupation for behavior analysts, and SOC 21-1018 also contains counseling roles requiring neither a master's nor board certification, so read $61,960 as a floor rather than as BCBA pay.

The number that stands out is the actual floor. The 10th percentile is $46,300, seventh-highest of the fifty metros here — above Boston, Los Angeles, Sacramento and San Diego. The 90th is $93,180. A high floor with a moderate ceiling gives a $46,880 spread, narrower than most.

On cost, prices across the metro run 3.1% below the national average, so $61,960 goes about as far as $63,942 would nationally — the ninth-best real figure in this guide. Milwaukee is a metro where an early-career behavior analyst does unusually well relative to the rest of the country, and where a senior one does adequately rather than exceptionally. For national context see our BCBA salary guide.

Other cities

Other cities in Wisconsin

Milwaukee is currently the only Wisconsin metro with its own guide. The state guide carries every program in Wisconsin plus the licensure picture.

All 50 city guides

Nearby metros

If you are flexible on metro

Chicago is ninety miles south with the Midwest's deepest program market, and Madison is eighty miles west with the state's entire federal developmental disabilities infrastructure. Between them they cover what Milwaukee lacks.

ABA Programs in Chicago

Ninety miles south, with an ABAI-accredited master's, the Midwest's deepest program market and a $114,770 top decile — in a separate licensing regime.

ABA Programs in Minneapolis

Five hours northwest, with the flattest pay curve in this guide and a license Minnesota only introduced in 2024.

ABA Programs in Wisconsin

The full state picture: the UW-Milwaukee certificate, the 2010 license, and the Waisman Center at UW-Madison.

Common questions

Frequently Asked Questions

01How many ABA programs are in Milwaukee?+
One offering, and it is a certificate rather than a degree. UW-Milwaukee runs a 22-credit Applied Behavior Analysis Graduate Certificate online at a flat $600 per credit for residents and non-residents. It satisfies the BACB coursework requirement and not the degree requirement, so it works only if you already hold a qualifying master's. Wisconsin has no active in-state ABA master's degree, which means a student starting from a bachelor's must take the degree online with an out-of-state university or relocate.
02Does Wisconsin really have no ABA master's?+
No active one, which is unusual for a state of nearly six million people that has licensed behavior analysts since 2010. UW-Milwaukee's graduate certificate covers the coursework sequence; the degree half of BCBA eligibility has to come from elsewhere. In practice Wisconsin students combine an online master's from an out-of-state university with local fieldwork, or take a master's in a related field — education, psychology, special education — and add the UW-Milwaukee certificate on top. The second route is common among teachers and school psychologists who already hold a qualifying degree.
03Do I need a license to practice ABA in Milwaukee?+
Yes. Wisconsin licenses behavior analysts through the Department of Safety and Professional Services and has since 2010, which places it among the earlier licensing states — well before the profession's national expansion. Your BCBA from the Behavior Analyst Certification Board is the qualifying credential and the state license is your practice authority; you hold both. If your caseload reaches south into Illinois, note that Illinois licenses separately through its Department of Financial and Professional Regulation and has since 2022.
04How much do BCBAs make in Milwaukee?+
The official BLS figure for the metro is $61,960 (SOC 21-1018, May 2025), $2,610 above the national median for the same code and fourteenth-highest of the fifty metros on this site. The figure that stands out is the 10th percentile at $46,300 — the seventh-highest entry floor in this guide, above Boston, Los Angeles and San Diego. The 90th is $93,180. That category mixes BCBAs with counselors who hold neither a master's nor board certification, so the top decile is the better guide to experienced roles. Prices run 3.1% below the national average, so the median is worth about $63,942 nationally.
05Where do Milwaukee ABA students do supervised fieldwork?+
Children's Wisconsin in Wauwatosa is the clinical anchor and the state's pediatric health system. Milwaukee Public Schools is Wisconsin's largest district, and the Waukesha County suburbs run well-resourced special education programs. Easterseals Southeast Wisconsin and the Medicaid-funded agency layer cover community and in-home work. The one thing not in the metro is the federal infrastructure: Wisconsin's UCEDD, LEND program and Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities Research Center are all at the Waisman Center at UW-Madison, eighty miles west, so a research-affiliated placement means traveling for it.
06Is Milwaukee a good place to start a BCBA career?+
For the first few years it is one of the better metros in this guide, and for later ones it is ordinary. A 10th percentile of $46,300 against a cost of living 3.1% below the national average means early-career pay here goes further than in most of the country, and the absence of a local master's program means fewer new graduates competing each year. Children's Wisconsin and a large district give real employer options. The limits are a $93,180 ceiling, no local research tier — the Waisman Center is eighty miles away — and the fact that qualifying means studying with a university somewhere else.

Sources

  1. University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, Applied Behavior Analysis Graduate Certificate
  2. Waisman Center, University of Wisconsin-Madison (UCEDD/LEND/IDDRC)
  3. Wisconsin Department of Safety and Professional Services
  4. BACB, U.S. Licensure of Behavior Analysts by State
  5. BLS OEWS May 2025, Milwaukee-Waukesha MSA (SOC 21-1018)
  6. Children's Wisconsin
  7. ABAI Accredited Programs Directory

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