Art Becker, CPG, MGWC, NGWAF, holds drilling licenses in 11 states and is president of Drilling and Safety Consultants LLC, which provides consulting services to the groundwater and drilling industries. He has more than 40 years of drilling industry experience with specific knowledge of water well, mineral, environmental, and geotechnical drilling applications.

Becker is chairman of the New Jersey State Well Drillers and Pump Installers Licensing and Examining Advisory Board. He served as the 2011 president of NGWA. Becker is a geology graduate of Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey-New Brunswick, New Jersey.

Jonathan “Jon” A. Zanders is currently a staff environmental scientist for Stone Environmental Engineering and Science Inc. He has more than 20 years of experience in the environmental field and is experienced in Phase I and Phase II environmental site assessments, UST closure and corrective actions, and sampling and analysis of soil, groundwater, building materials, sediments, surface water, and wastewater. Zanders also has extensive experience in project field management, site supervision, health and safety, report preparation, and data interpretation and management.

Throughout his career, he has worked for Barium & Chemicals Inc. of Steubenville, Ohio, a former Union Carbide facility in Ashtabula, Ohio, and ESAB Welding & Cutting Products of Taneytown, Maryland. From 2006-2010, Zanders participated in the Nielsen Field School North American Environmental Conference and Exposition (NAEFCon) with a groundwater focus. He also participated in the Ohio EPA Division of Environmental Response and Revitalization/Voluntary Action Program Ground Water Training, Well Development, and Ground Water Sampling in 2013.

Heather Martin, Ph.D., has taught writing and research at the University of Denver for more than 12 years in both the English Department and the University Writing Program. In addition to teaching, she facilitates writing workshops for students, faculty, and professionals in diverse fields. Martin received her Ph.D. in English from the University of Denver.

Brad Benz, Ph.D., teaches technical writing and argumentation courses at the University of Denver, where he is a lecturer in the writing program. A rhetorician and linguist, he received his Ph.D. in English language and rhetoric from the University of Washington.

Richard Thron, MGWC, is currently with Mantyla Well Drilling Inc. in Lakeland, Minnesota, where he began working full-time in 1966. He enjoyed limited ownership in the company from 1973 to 2000 when he became the sole owner.

Thron, an NGWA member since the 1980s, has served on numerous Association committees and taskforces. In addition, he was president in 2015 and is currently a director. Thron has also participated in several panel discussions and seminars as a speaker on DOT-OSHA, safety, air rotary drilling, public education, and other related topics.

Denis Crayon, CHST, is the director of Health and Safety for Summit Drilling Co. Inc. He began his career working for Aquifer Drilling/Testing in Queens, New York, as an apprentice/driller. He earned a journeyman license drilling for HRS/B&B Drilling in New Jersey and drilled at ADT/Diamond Drilling, also in New Jersey. Crayon moved to Summit Drilling in Bridgewater, New Jersey, as a driller and became fleet mechanic, purchasing manager, and director of health and safety. Equipment he operated included IR T-3/T-4, Gus Pech, Mobile, CME, and Acker. He received BCSP certification as a CHST in 2010. His credentials include OSHA 10/30 Hour Construction/General Industry Trainer, First Aid/CPR Trainer, and Defensive Driving Instructor. In addition, he provides other health and safety trainings. Crayon currently serves as a director on the NGWA Board of Directors and as the president of the New Jersey Ground Water Association.

Bill Deutsch, Geochemistry Services LLC, is a groundwater geochemist with more than 40 years of experience. He’s been involved with all aspects of contamination characterization, fate and transport modeling, and remediation. Deutsch’s project experience includes environmental assessments and investigations of landfills, manufacturing plants, refineries, pesticide plants/distributorships, military bases, mines and mills, federal weapons facilities, and a wide variety of additional industrial sites. He’s also participated in remedial designs of sites contaminated with metals, radionuclides, pesticides, solvents, petroleum hydrocarbons, and ordnance compounds. Deutsch worked as a research scientist for 13 years at Pacific Northwest National Laboratory and as a consultant for more than 27 years. Since 1985, he has instructed more than 190 classes on groundwater geochemistry and geochemical modeling for professional organizations, federal/state agencies, and private companies. Deutsch is the author of Groundwater Geochemistry published by CRC Press in 1997.

David P. Gold, Ph.D., (B.S., M.S. geology, University of Natal, South Africa; Ph.D. geology, McGill University, Montreal) has conducted detailed geologic and structural mapping in Canada, Africa, and the United States, and has taught courses in photogeology, remote sensing, and structural geology at Penn State University since 1968.

Gold also served on the MLA-MRS Advisory Group (NASA) on remote sensing and space technology in the 1980s. Gold has written and presented many papers involving the use of remote sensing for natural resources and environmental problems and investigations, with emphasis on lineament and fracture relationships and geologic and structural mapping, and authored chapters on the applications of remote sensing to structural geology in both the Manual of Remote Sensing and Remote Sensing in Geology texts.

Chuck Job, NGWA regulatory affairs manager, also addresses groundwater resource sustainability. He previously worked at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency for more than 29 years, having served since 2000 as its infrastructure branch chief. While there, he worked with states to utilize a backlog of more than $1 billion in infrastructure financial assistance, and also led critical work in standards and risk management, underground injection control, regulatory coordination, and information collection. During part of his agency tenure, Job worked in EPA Region 5 in Chicago in groundwater protection and water quality standards planning.

Previously, Job worked as a planner for the Ohio Department of Natural Resources and the Great Lakes Basin Commission, and as a financial analyst for Fortune 500 companies. He also was a charter participant in the development of the National Ground-Water Monitoring Network, a multiagency, private sector data sharing project. Job earned master’s degrees in environmental science (Miami University) and applied economics (University of Michigan). He holds credentials as a sustainability professional with both the U.S. Green Building Council and the Institute for Sustainable Infrastructure.

Jeffrey A. Johnson, Ph.D., CPG, LRS, is currently working as a geologist with NewFields. Having more than 25 years of professional experience in natural resource assessment, site characterization, remedial operations, and technical analyses, he’s worked on various projects throughout North America for major petroleum corporations, legal firms, manufacturing companies, and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. Johnson has worked on groundwater/surface water issues for more than 20 years. For the past 10 years, he has worked extensively in the characterization and remediation of LNAPL and DNAPL sites, and is actively working on NAPL impacts to sediments and characterizing the differences between groundwater and in situ NAPL emplacement. Johnson holds a Ph.D. in geology from the University of California, Berkeley.

Meng Ling, Ph.D., PE, with AME Inc., has 20 years of experience in environmental and municipal engineering. His professional expertise includes site characterization and remediation, groundwater and NAPL modeling, visualization and litigation support, statistical and geostatistical analysis, monitoring optimization, water and wastewater engineering, and environmental software development. Ling’s authored a variety of publications regarding groundwater modeling and monitoring, NAPL characterization and assessment, litigation support, and other technical issues. He is also a coauthor of the Monitoring and Remediation Optimization System, or MAROS, decision-support software developed by the Air Force Center for Environmental Excellence. In addition, Johnson is a frequent presenter at environmental conferences and workshops. He holds a B.S in civil engineering, an M.S. in municipal engineering, and a Ph.D. in environmental engineering.

Richard R. Parizek received a B.A. in geology from the University of Connecticut, and an M.S. and a Ph.D. in geology from the University of Illinois. He has been involved in educational aspects of groundwater science for more than 43 years. Since 1961, he has taught hydrogeology, geomorphology, glacial geology, and environmental geology courses at Pennsylvania State University, as well as conducting various workshops and short courses in hydrogeology and remote sensing.

Parizek formerly conducted research at the Ground Water Geology and Geophysical Exploration Section of the Illinois State Geological Survey and the Saskatchewan Research Council, Saskatchewan, Canada. He is a codeveloper with L.A. Lattman of the fracture trace method of groundwater exploration.

Parizek has authored and presented numerous papers on the application of remote sensing and fracture trace techniques for the solution of various hydrogeological, geotechnical, and environmental problems including water well location, lineament mapping, contaminant migration, monitoring and cleanup, flow in karst terrains, and the siting of radioactive waste repositories.

In addition to receiving the M. King-Hubbard Science Award for 1993, the Hydrogeology Division Distinguished Service Award from the Geological Society of America, the 2001 C.V. Theis Award, American Institute of Hydrology, and other awards, he has served for more than eight years on the Nuclear Waste Review Board, which is charged with the review and analysis of the U.S. DOE Yucca Mountain Project.

Roger E. Renner, MGWC, NGWAF, is president of E.H. Renner & Sons Inc. He is the fourth of five generations of this family-owned business located in Elk River, Minnesota. Aside from the overall operation of this business, he is specifically responsible for the municipal, large well sealing, and monitoring markets.

Renner is a long-time member of NGWA. He is also a past president of NGWA, past president of the Minnesota Water Well Association, and a member and chair of the Minnesota Department of Health Advisory Council on Wells and Borings.

Donald Rosenberry, Ph.D., is a research hydrologist with the U.S. Geological Survey’s National Research Program specializing in wetland hydrology, water budgets of lakes and wetlands, and hyporheic processes. His research is focused on the sediment/water interface with an emphasis on understanding processes that control exchanges between groundwater and surface water. He is also the coordinator of the Shingobee Headwaters Aquatic Ecosystem Project in which scientists from the USGS and academia work together to study physical, chemical, and biological processes of lakes, wetlands, and streams at a small-watershed scale. Rosenberry’s interests in groundwater, surface water, and the dynamic sediment/water interface stem from his formative years at Bemidji State University located on the shore of one of Minnesota’s 10,000 lakes, the University of Minnesota located on the banks of the Mississippi River, and the University of Colorado through which Boulder Creek flows.

Kevin Russell is a principal with Anchor QEA, an environmental consulting firm specializing in aquatic, shoreline, and water resource projects. He has more than 20 years of experience in the field, and has directed and managed numerous projects on behalf of both government and private sector clients in the areas of contaminated soil and groundwater investigation; contaminated sediment management; pollutant fate, transport, and bioaccumulation; surface water quality/eutrophication; and stream hydraulic analysis. Many of these projects have included the development of mathematical models to understand the fate and transport of contaminants in surface water and groundwater systems, and the application of these models to assist in the evaluation and design of remedial alternatives, including monitored natural recovery programs. Russell also has considerable experience in the evaluation and modeling of groundwater/surface water interactions, including application of transport models to guide contaminated sediment remediation programs. He’s a member of several professional organizations, has presented numerous technical papers at scientific conferences, has given invited lectures at universities, and has served as a peer reviewer for technical research journals. Russell holds a master’s degree in civil (environmental) engineering from the State University of New York at Buffalo.

Kevin Svitana, Ph.D., PG, teaches environmental science classes and is the director of the Environmental Studies Program at Otterbein University. With more than 35 years of experience as a geologist and more than 35 years as a hydrogeologist, as well as being an Ohio Voluntary Action Program-certified environmental professional, his diverse professional experience ranges from mineral and water resource evaluation and environmental impact studies to the assessment and remediation of hazardous waste sites. In addition, Svitana also works with regulated entities regarding environmental compliance and safety, as well as working part-time with BSI Consulting Services as a senior project manager.

Stuart A. Smith, CGWP, RG, hydrogeologist and microbiologist, is a partner in Smith-Comeskey Ground Water Science LLC and Ground+Water Tanzania Ltd. He has more than 35 years’ experience in the application of research, analysis, training, and consulting related to groundwater and wells, with a focus on efficient and cost-effective analysis and rehabilitation of well problems, and well and wellfield asset management. He is a pioneer in applying practical biofouling analytical methods in groundwater system analysis, rehabilitation, and asset management.

Smith is the author or coauthor of numerous publications, including Sustainable Wells: Maintenance, Problem Prevention, and Rehabilitation (CRC Press), the American Water Works Association’s manual M21 Groundwater; CRC Press’ Drilling: The Manual of Methods, Applications, and Management and its predecessors, and NGWA’s Manual of Water Well Construction Practices. He’s also contributed elsewhere to the literature of well maintenance and rehabilitation practice, starting with Water Well Journal® articles in 1980, and continuing through ASCE’s International Well Hydraulics Manual. He has instructed on, and set up, well and wellfield maintenance programs across the United States and in Argentina, Jordan, and Australia.

Past-chair of Standard Methods for the Examination of Water and Wastewater joint task group for Section 9240 Iron and Sulfur Bacteria, Smith is also a long-time volunteer and instructor with NGWA, and was active in the development of the NGWA-01-14 Water Well Construction Standard. He holds B.A. and M.S. degrees from Wittenberg University and Ohio State University, respectively.

Nilson Guiguer, Ph.D., is a director for Water Services and Technologies, a specialized consultancy firm, and an adjunct professor at the Federal University of Santa Catarina in Brazil. He’s also the founder and former president of Waterloo Hydrogeologic and former vice president of Schlumberger Water Services. An expert in groundwater simulation and an author of many groundwater software packages, including Visual MODFLOW, Flowpath, Airflow/SVE, Flonet, and others, he routinely applies MODFLOW- and FEFLOW-based models to a variety of projects involving water supply, mine dewatering, and contaminant transport.

A recognized instructor of professional short courses on groundwater modeling applications and on integrated water resources worldwide, Guiguer is a past recipient of NGWA’s John Hem Award for Excellence in Science & Engineering, presented in recognition of a significant contribution to the understanding of groundwater. He holds a M.Sc. in hydraulics from the University of Sao Paulo and a Ph.D. in hydrogeology from the University of Waterloo.