It’s become kind of a ritual with me at the start of the new year. Before I put the past year’s calendar away, I take a quick look through it to remind of what I did in the past year. As was skimming through my 2019 calendar I noticed it was another good year for learning. By this I mean I attended a lot of meetings where presentations on our industry, water and wastewater treatment, were provided. I attended more than 20 meetings in 2019. Between section meetings, workshops, and conferences; and our professional organizations OWEA, OHAWWA, OTCO, WEF, and AWWA, the available educational content was quite good. We as members of these professional organizations have many opportunities to meet and learn something so we stay current with what’s going on in our industry. Most everyone in our profession needs to get a certain number of continuing education units (CEUs) or professional development hours (PDHs) to maintain their licenses. Even though this seems like a burden to some, I believe it’s vitally important to keep learning. My job doesn’t require a license, so I don’t need CEUs and PDHs. But I dare say I wouldn’t be very effective as a sales representative without these learning opportunities . The speed of advancement of technology in our industry is incredible. Without the continuing education requirements one could quickly fall behind. Fortunately, we have these great professional organizations which provide us with so many opportunities to get CEUs and PDHs throughout the year.
Smith Environmental 