President's Message
March 2010
We Welcome Our New Executive Director
The Board of Directors has approved hiring Susan L. Best, PE as the Executive Director of the Engineers' Club. As you may recall, Diane Conway left the Executive Director's position in October 2009 to pursue other interests. To maintain a continuous "flow" of programs, efforts and plans underway, the Board needed to act quickly to fill the gap created by Diane?s departure. An individual with knowledge and background in the Club's operations, issues and future plans would be the best candidate for the position. Fortunately, the Board was able to act quickly and had the good fortune of having the "Best" candidate readily available in the form of Susan Best.
After some discussion with the Club's Executive Committee, Susan agreed to serve as the Interim Executive Director for a six-month period, during which the Board would observe her activity and actions and see how things went. As time tends to do, it flew by, and soon enough the six-month interim period was coming to a close. Directed by Susan?s strong organizational abilities and management, as well as her knowledge of and experience in the engineering field, the Club has continued to grow in its role as the engineering center of the Delaware Valley. Granted, as we all know, this has been a difficult and "uphill" effort, Susan's ability to step in and continue our outreach efforts and expansion was greatly appreciated.
The Board recognized this, and at the March 16 Board meeting, offered Susan the opportunity to remove the "Interim" part of her title. Fortunately, she has accepted this offer, and has become our full-fledged Executive Director.
Susan has over thirty years of experience in the areas of traffic engineering, highway planning, transportation facility design, and traffic planning. She has worked at several local firms in her career, most recently at Urban Engineers, and has been a key part of numerous local projects, in addition to being involved in critical efforts in Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Delaware and Maryland. She is a 1976 graduate of the University of Delaware, where she received her Bachelor?s degree in Civil Engineering. After graduation, she spent some time on the "left coast", during which she earned a Masters degree in Civil Engineering from the California State University in Los Angeles.
You've no doubt seen Susan at various technical society meetings, as she is an extremely active member of groups such as the American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE) and American Society of Highway Engineers (ASHE). She has served in officer and Board capacities for the Society of Women Engineers (SWE), the Delaware County Chapter of the Pennsylvania Society of Professional Engineers (PSPE), and the Mid-Atlantic Section, Institute of Transportation Engineers (MASITE). She recently completed a three-year term as Director on the International Board of Direction for ITE and is a Fellow of SWE, ITE, and ASCE. As the Senior Vice Chair of the Delaware Valley Engineers Week Council for many years, she has been in the forefront of the Council's successful events. She has been instrumental in the local Future City Competition as well.
Susan's efforts have been recognized by the Philadelphia Section ASCE (Transportation Engineer of the Year, 2005) and Delaware County Chapter PSPE (Delaware County Engineer of the Year, 2005).
In order to avoid any conflicts of interest, Susan has resigned her position on the Club's Board as well as the Chair of the Delaware Valley Engineers Week Committee. Her talents and abilities will be sorely missed in both positions.
Susan and her husband, Fran Talarowski, live in Havertown. Somehow, in addition to everything already mentioned, she finds time to remain very active in local Boy Scout programs and in her church's vocal and handbell choirs.
Sincerely,
Eric L. Flicker, PE
President