Environmental Engineering MSE

I started working in engineering consulting specializing in solid waste management. After graduation from UM, I moved to Kansas City to work for a large engineering firm, Burns & McDonnell. I worked on solid waste planning projects, groundwater monitoring and investigation projects, and ultimately landfill design and construction projects. I worked my way up from a project engineer to a project manager at BMcD. 

In 2001, my wife and I decided to move back to Michigan. I was recruited to work for another consulting firm in Livonia, Michigan to help manage their solid waste consulting practice. The firm was ultimately acquired by a company that went bankrupt and acquired another larger firm. In 2006, a group of us decided to start our own consulting firm, Cornerstone Environmental Group, LLC. I started by managing our local Michigan office but over time I was promoted to Region Vice President and managed the entire midwest operation. I was working primarily on landfill and renewable energy projects. In 2016, we sold the firm to Tetra Tech. In 2019 I decided to move out of consulting and I started working at EDL and I am now part of the Project Delivery Team responsible for developing renewable energy projects.

Reflection on Time Spent at UM

I still have a lot of my friendships from UM and I especially value my time working on the concrete canoe.

As an undergraduate and Master’s student at Michigan, I had the opportunity to participate in a couple of research projects and to work as a grader, then as a GSI. One of my semesters grading, the class was taught by Erik Petrovskis who managed Geosyntec’s Ann Arbor office. Making that connection with Erik helped me land my current job at Geosyntec. At Geosyntec, I’ve gone from being out in the field collecting groundwater & soil samples and drafting reports to managing projects and helping clients figure out how best to address legacy contaminated sites. This past semester, I taught CEE 465 at Michigan, which is essentially the same class Erik had taught when I was a student. My professional life has come full circle.

How does your Master’s degree differentiate you from others?

Geosyntec particularly values advanced degrees. I’m not sure I would have been hired without a Master’s degree. And while I am continually learning new things, the deeper technical understanding and critical thinking skills from a postgraduate education make the learning curve less steep.

Reflection on Time Spent at U-M

As a student, I enjoyed attending ASCE and Chi Epsilon speaker meetings (free food is always appreciated) and Michigan football games (despite my time as a student corresponding with the lowest point of Michigan football in the past 80 years). If I could go back in time, I would give myself two pieces of advice as a student: First, networking (along with getting a good education, exhibiting leadership, etc.) is important. A big part of why I got hired at Geosyntec was that the office manager had taught a course at Michigan, and I was his grader. Seeing it from the other side now, hiring someone is a big decision. The company is going to invest a lot of resources in a new hire’s professional development, particularly for entry-level hires. If it doesn’t work out, those resources are wasted. Knowing somebody and knowing that they do good work goes a long way. Second, as a student, I undervalued the technical communication side of things. Now, the main thing that I produce is reports. Technical understanding is important, but it’s not useful if you can’t convey that understanding effectively to clients and regulators.

Following my graduate research and studies, I joined Brown and Caldwell (BC), where I served as a process engineer for both drinking water and wastewater. Within a year, I was able to leverage my UM research on biological filtration to a pilot-scale study for the cities of Lake Oswego and Tigard. Because of this experience, I was able to manage this pilot study investigating ballasted flocculation, ozonation, and high-rate biological filtration (the first pilot study for high-rate filtration in the state of Oregon). Operating this pilot equipment and informing the detailed design for a 38 million gallons per day (mgd) facility was an amazing experience!

Another cool project that I worked on early in my career was the process design for a sludge process where I was intimately involved in the secondary biological treatment process selection. This work also involved pilot testing an ammonium removal process. Following the pilot investigation, I led the detail design for the process, which was constructed and is in operation. My experience at UM made this project involvement possible.

Currently, I am a Principal Engineer for BC and our client service manager for the Water Research Foundation (WRF). In this role, I guide which WRF projects we pursue as a company. Over the past 5 years, I’ve been the Co-Principal Investigator (Co-PI) on 8 WRF projects, and I’m currently a Co-PI on the Biofiltration Guidance Manual for Rapid-Rate Filtration Facilities.

I’ve also had the opportunity to expand my water quality/treatment knowledge and apply it to planning and climate change resiliency projects. For instance, I have worked with the Honolulu Board of Water Supply to assess climate change impacts to groundwater supplies and water infrastructure. I also published the Blueprint for One Water, which focuses on guidance for utility managers looking to embark on One Water or integrated water resources framework.

I also serve as BC’s One Water lead for the Pacific Northwest where I support strategy and projects in drinking water, reuse, and integrated water management. UM gave me the foundation for my career, but my project experience has launched my skillset and knowledge of what it is today.

Favorite Student Orgs

I got involved in Sa Nim√° Collaborative, which joined BLUElab. From 2002 until 2008, Sa Nim√° worked in Rancho al Medio, a small village of 1,400 people in the Dominican Republic (DR). During my trip to the DR, I focused on water quality testing and assessing drinking water systems. As a part of the student leadership, we decided that we had made sufficient progress in the DR and chose a rural community in Guatemala, Samox San Lucas, and a partnering NGO, CasaSito, to continue to help. In this new community, we built point-of-use bio-sand filters for the schools. It was an incredible experience! I learned so much about what true community is about and how the challenges with improving health and sanitation in the developing world are much less about the engineering hurdles, but more about the societal and social hurdles. It also taught me invaluable leadership skills. Brown and Caldwell also supported me to go down for another trip to Guatemala where I followed up on our projects. I am thankful that I got involved in this organization. I highly recommend finding a way to apply your talents and ambitions to give back to a community in need.

Graduated with M.S.E in Environmental Engineering in May 2013 (Ann Arbor). I worked on research over the summer at U of M and I also did an internship at the Michigan Department of Environmental Quality (MDEQ) for 2 semesters. This internship led to a job offer from Detroit. I worked as a Project Engineer (Energy and Environment Division) in Detroit for 2 years with FutureNet Group. I worked on projects related to soil and sediment sampling in Indiana and Illinois for our client (U.S. Army Corps of Engineers). I also worked on soil/groundwater remediation projects. In 2016, I started my Ph.D. in Environmental Engineering at Michigan State University. I taught multiple courses here at MSU as a student instructor/TA. The aquatic chemistry course I took in U of M helped me teach a similar course here for graduate/undergraduate students. 

How does your Master’s degree differentiate you from others?

Some of the team projects I did during my master’s program has helped me develop better skills in team building and team management. 

Reflection on Time Spent at U-M

I liked the welcome meet and greet organized by the department in Arbor Brewing Company when we initially entered the program in fall 2011. I liked the course related to Geoenvironmental engineering taught by Dr. Zekkos Advice: Explore the campus and all that it has to offer. You can make connections in the unlikeliest places and it helps you in more ways than one.