Tag: service

Last weekend 20,000 or so people who care deeply about and work in the water industry arrived in Los Angeles for the annual WEFTEC convention. We come to share our work and learn from each other, see old friends and learn about new technologies. For the past decade I’ve been heavily involved with the Water Environment Federation, especially in the role of creating opportunities for young, new members of our community.

One of the activities that we started four years ago is a water-related community service project associated with WEFTEC. The idea was to have something that allowed us to give back to the city where WEFTEC is held, since we experience that city’s benefits for a week. Last year we had an awesome project in the area of New Orleans most badly damaged by Hurricane Katrina.

This year we partnered with the City of Los Angeles to help them with a project in a tough neighborhood in South LA. Championed by a few city council members, the overall project included a brand new high school and took a blighted industrial lot across the street and converted it to a wetlands park. The park incorporates all kinds of cool engineering to collect and direct stormwater, treating it naturally and using it to create a habitat for plants and hopefully animals. The neighborhood we worked in is “park poor”, meaning they had a major lack of green space, so this wetlands park will be a huge asset and a hands-on education to the high school students next door.

Our part of the project was planting 37 trees along the street between the high school and the park. Our volunteers first installed novel collection pipes that would use rainwater runoff on the street to water each tree directly. These trees were specifically chosen because they are native to LA and able to adapt to long dry spells.

I’m so glad to be part of a trade organization that allows the young leadership to organize events like this. I’m proud of my friends on the Students and Young Professionals Committee, including Haley Falconer, who chaired this event. And of course I’m grateful to the young volunteers who took their Saturday at a big conference and went to work, many of whom were students from all over the country, like University of Miami and North Dakota State University.

The WEF YP Service Project is just one of the ways my friends and I are creating opportunities for young engineers (including us!) to develop leadership skills. There’s nothing quite like trying to organize a big event like this to teach you how to lead.

Last weekend 20,000 or so people who care deeply about and work in the water industry arrived in Los Angeles for the annual WEFTEC convention. We come to share our work and learn from each other, see old friends and learn about new technologies. For the past decade I’ve been heavily involved with the Water Environment Federation, especially in the role of creating opportunities for young, new members of our community.

One of the activities that we started four years ago is a water-related community service project associated with WEFTEC. The idea was to have something that allowed us to give back to the city where WEFTEC is held, since we experience that city’s benefits for a week. Last year we had an awesome project in the area of New Orleans most badly damaged by Hurricane Katrina.

This year we partnered with the City of Los Angeles to help them with a project in a tough neighborhood in South LA. Championed by a few city council members, the overall project included a brand new high school and took a blighted industrial lot across the street and converted it to a wetlands park. The park incorporates all kinds of cool engineering to collect and direct stormwater, treating it naturally and using it to create a habitat for plants and hopefully animals. The neighborhood we worked in is “park poor”, meaning they had a major lack of green space, so this wetlands park will be a huge asset and a hands-on education to the high school students next door.

Our part of the project was planting 37 trees along the street between the high school and the park. Our volunteers first installed novel collection pipes that would use rainwater runoff on the street to water each tree directly. These trees were specifically chosen because they are native to LA and able to adapt to long dry spells.

I’m so glad to be part of a trade organization that allows the young leadership to organize events like this. I’m proud of my friends on the Students and Young Professionals Committee, including Haley Falconer, who chaired this event. And of course I’m grateful to the young volunteers who took their Saturday at a big conference and went to work, many of whom were students from all over the country, like University of Miami and North Dakota State University.

The WEF YP Service Project is just one of the ways my friends and I are creating opportunities for young engineers (including us!) to develop leadership skills. There’s nothing quite like trying to organize a big event like this to teach you how to lead.