When Passions and Career Intersect: What a Ride!

by Libby Ford

It all started with the Girl Scouts. As I was growing up, I lived for the two weeks each summer during which I went to Girl Scout camp. Following a "progression" that I was only vaguely aware of as a child, I moved from in-camp programs, which included swimming (in a lake or river, not a pool) and rudimentary canoeing, to extended canoeing trips, through leadership training, working at a camp, eventually conducting canoeing trips, and ultimately moving to the Rochester, New York, area to serve as the waterfront director at one of the local Girl Scout camps.

By the time I went to college (in the early seventies) I knew I wanted to "study water" but had no idea what that meant. I majored in biology and, by the time I began my senior year, I had begun to focus my electives on the emerging field of aquatic ecology, eventually taking any course Notre Dame offered that had the words "ecology" or "environment" in its title. This included classes from the university's environmental health engineering department. At the same time, I realized what so many biology majors of that time (and, too often, today) were faced with: if you didn't want to go into medicine, there were virtually no jobs for graduates with a B.S. in biology. During my senior year there was only one on-campus interview for biology majors, with an animal food manufacturer, and my letters to possible employers seemed to be falling off the edge of the earth. Not surprisingly, I opted to go on to graduate school. While I looked into continuing on in biology, and specifically aquatic ecology, I just couldn't get enthused about studying which insects fed on oak leaves when they fell into streams, and then who ate what was left over. I wanted to study ways to help stop water pollution.

I had done well in my engineering classes, and one of my professors suggested that I consider applying to Notre Dame's graduate program in environmental health engineering. He even mentioned that he could probably get me an EPA environmental law traineeship grant. These grants were being made available to a limited number of Notre Dame law and environmental health engineering students. The concept was not to turn engineering students into lawyers (or vice versa), but rather, to get them to understand each other's terminology and thought processes and to learn to work as a team to tackle environmental problems. I received the grant, and 11 months later I received my master's degree in environmental health engineering. One of the greatest pieces of advice I ever received in graduate school was from another professor who told everyone in our incoming class that, if we were serious about going into the water pollution control field, then we needed to join the Water Pollution Control Federation (the predecessor to WEF). This advice has stood me in good stead ever since. Having attended a former all-male university during its first years of coeducation, it shouldn't have surprised me when, at graduation one of my professors told me that I "was one of the best female students" he had ever taught. I thanked him for the compliment but then asked him how I rated with respect to all the students he had taught. Looking very disconcerted, he mumbled something about my rating being pretty high in that respect also, and hurriedly turned away.

Because I had continued to work at the Rochester-area Girl Scout camp during the summers up until I went to graduate school, and because my friends from Notre Dame were scattering across the globe, I concentrated my initial job-hunting efforts in Rochester. While no one was quite sure what to make of someone with a B.S. in biology and an M.S. in environmental health engineering, I was lucky enough to land a job with a small, start-up engineering firm researching and writing environmental impact statements for collection sewer projects being funded by construction grants. However, within a year that firm decided that it wanted to grow into areas outside my expertise, and I decided I was ready for a different challenge.

Despite the "environmental law" aspect of my graduate education, I was as surprised as anyone when I was offered, and accepted, a position with the Nixon, Hargrave, Devans, and Doyle law firm (now Nixon Peabody LLP) as a member of their new environmental law department. Neither the firm nor I knew whether there was a place for an environmental scientist/engineer within a law firm, but we all decided to give it a year trial period. Quickly we learned that both our clients and the environmental agencies we dealt with liked being able to talk to a technical person who also had a good grasp of the legal requirements. I was fortunate because I was able to enter the field just as the National and State Pollution Discharge Elimination System (N/SPDES) permitting effort was hitting its stride. In the early 1980s the industrial pretreatment program was born, and I expanded my water permitting experience into that arena also. This interest and focus brought me to my first Water Environment Federation's Technical Exhibition and Conference (WEFTEC) meeting, presenting a paper on the new industrial pretreatment requirements. While there were some women at these and the next several WEF meetings I went to, we were a small band. In fact, at my first WEFTEC meeting, there were so few women there that I was able to practice my entire 20-minute talk aloud in the ladies room-without anyone walking in!

Because my job responsibilities include staying on top of new and emerging federal and state water-related regulations, my employer sees the wisdom of supporting my involvement in both WEF and NYWEA. Both organizations offer me great opportunities not only to stay on top of new developments, but also to form a wide network with other water experts working across the country and around the globe. Over the years there have been numerous times when I have picked up the telephone or, in more recent years, sent an e-mail to a WEF or NYWEA colleague to ask for information or to bounce an idea off them. This network helps me look smart to both our attorneys and clients!

In addition to this invaluable network, I found that my committee work not only allows me to stay on top of emerging developments, but it also gives me a chance to grow my leadership skills. Within both organizations I had the opportunity to chair subcommittees first, then full committees, and to represent WEF to other outside organizations. One of these latter opportunities came after I earned my qualified environmental professional (QEP) credential from the Institute of Professional Environmental Practice (IPEP).

Because I never worked long enough under the direct supervision of a professional engineer, I was not able to earn a PE license. I did, however, feel that it was important to earn an independent credential that was recognized by other water and environmental professionals. For a few years I became a "certification junkie," earning the certified hazardous materials manager (CHMM) and certified environmental professional (CEP) credentials, as well as becoming a registered environmental assessor in California (where, for a time, I did a fair amount of work). When WEF decided to join with the Air and Waste Management Association, the Solid Waste Association of North America, the American Academy of Environmental Engineers, and the National Association for Environmental Management in establishing the QEP credential, I knew that I had found what I was looking for-a credential that was supported and recognized by my peers, the men and women working to protect the global and local environment. I'll admit that I struggled a bit to pass the oral exam, but like most things worth having, it was worth the time and energy I invested. Since earning my QEP credential, I have been privileged to represent WEF on the IPEP Board of Trustees. Today, I am working with other WEF QEPs to develop the updated Water Specialty Exam, which IPEP is intending to test at the upcoming WEFTEC. In recognition of the breadth of the water quality control field and more recent and emerging issues and developments, we've updated the Water Body of Knowledge (Water BoK), which is the list of topics that an experienced environmental professional who professes to have an expertise in water should know. We are now drawing upon recognized reference texts to match questions to the Water BoK. Like so many things I do with WEF and NYWEA, I'm finding this effort to be educational for me as I work to integrate my knowledge and experience within the broader context reflected in the Water BoK.

Having two children has brought me full circle to my early days where I spent my summers helping kids learn to love water. When my partner and I decided to home school our children about four years ago, I "floated" the idea to four other home schooling families of my teaching a water science class to a group of interested kids. The following spring found me going home early on Friday afternoons to work with nine girls (ages 8 to 14) around our dining room table discussing basic scientific principles as they related to water (density, miscibility, etc.) and then adjourning to the adjacent "lab" (our kitchen) to carry out simple experiments. Members of the Genesee Valley Chapter Industrial Issues Committee who worked for local industry, labs, and Monroe County Pure Waters loaned or donated lab equipment. We sampled and cultured water from different local water bodies, tracked families' home water usage, and watched the PBS video series on international water issues that WEF had underwritten. Our work culminated the following summer when the five families went camping and the girls did a pond study at a local camp. Again using donated/borrowed tools and equipment, they measured pH, netted and identified fish, and identified the floating plant mass. Ultimately the girls made a series of easy, low cost recommendations to the property owner who in turn has implemented the chief recommendation.

As we move through this not-so-new millennium, I'm looking forward to the continued challenges of a career that integrates legal requirements with the realities of what is technically feasible and reasonably cost effective. Working on such issues as establishing total maximum daily loads (TMDLs), negotiating permit limits under a TMDL, and dealing with wet weather and other emerging issues such as pharmaceuticals in natural waters-keeps me challenged, enthused, and looking forward to work each day. I've also recently emerged from a week in the classroom, hoping to apply my training as a mediator to complex environmental disputes.

Often I'm told that people don't understand how I do all I do, and they ask me why I "donate" so much time and energy to WEF, NYWEA, IPEP, and the other professional organizations in which I'm active. I guess it comes down to several things: first, I still have my passion for protecting the water environment and, for me, it's a lifelong learning experience. Second, I have always felt that you learn and comprehend more if you hang around with experts who are working in your profession; and, finally, as one of my favorite sayings goes, "When you reach the end of your life, the point is not to arrive looking rested and refined, but to slide in sideways saying, 'Wow, what a ride!'"

Libby Ford, QEP, is a senior environmental health engineer with the law firm of Nixon Peabody LLP. She's been a member of WEF since 1976 and of NYWEA since 1977. Libby can be reached at lford@nixonpeabody.com .