NOTE: I am mostly retired and am not seeking employment at this time.
Overview and Education
Skills: Software design and development, database programming, web programming, technical writing, teaching/training, Spanish (advanced), French (intermediate).
Computer Languages, Technologies, and Operating Systems: Drupal, WordPress, PHP, MySQL/Microsoft SQLServer, JavaScript, Python, Perl/CGI, HTML/CSS, XML, C/C++, S-Plus, R, GAMS, Java/EJB/JSP, Visual Basic/VBA, UNIX/Linux/Cygwin, Windows, Git, Subversion.
Ph.D., Physics, January 1993, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY. National Science Foundation Graduate Fellowship, Cornell Sage Supplementary Fellowship, U.S. Department of Education National Needs in Materials Physics Fellowship.
B.S., magna cum laude, with College Honors in Physics, March 1988, University of Washington, Seattle, WA. National Merit Scholarship Finalist, Honors Program Scholarship, Freshman Chemistry Achievement Award, Phi Beta Kappa.
Employment
Portland General Electric, Portland, OR. March 2004 to present. Part-time consultant (contracting directly with PGE or employed by contracting firm). Developed and modified statistical software in support of utility regulatory filings (R/VBA/Python/GAMS/Excel/SQL).
Poplar ProductivityWare, Seattle and Spokane, WA. April 2001 to September 2021. Owner and Head Consultant. Originally formed company as sole proprietor; reformed as Poplar ProductivityWare LLC in May 2003. Offered freelance services in software development, web site development, technical training, and tutoring.
O'Reilly Media, summer 2012. Author of Programmer's Guide to Drupal.
Seattle Central Community College, Seattle WA. January 2002 to March 2002. Part-time Faculty. Planned, taught, and graded university-level Visual Basic programming course.
American School of International Training, Seattle, WA. March 2001. English as a Second Language Teacher. Developed lessons and taught hands-on practical "Active English" course for Japanese high school exchange students.
Kiodex, Inc., New York, NY. April 2000 to February 2001. Software Developer. Developed software (Java/EJB/JSP, on UNIX/ClearCase) and wrote on-line help and other documentation (Word, HTML) for commodities trading risk management software. Acted as consultant for system architecture and models. Spurred adoption of software coding standards and development process.
MathSoft, Inc., Seattle WA [now part of Tibco]. June 1997 to December 1999. Research Software Developer. Developed software (C/C++/VC++/MFC/Perl/Visual Basic/S-PLUS, on Windows/UNIX/CVS) and wrote documentation (FrameMaker) for statistical and image processing software. Architected data structures and led effort for software coding/documentation standards in creation of image processing library for medical images. Created production software, including user manual, for time series analysis.
Goldman, Sachs & Co., New York, NY. January 1994 to January 1996 as employee, continuing to September 1996 as consultant. Strategist Associate. Created models (Mathematica/S-Plus), software and web sites (C/scripting/HTML, on OS/2/Unix), and client presentations (PowerPoint) for commodities trading risk management. Supported commodities trading desk with software for risk management and securities pricing.
AT&T Bell Laboratories, Murray Hill, NJ [now Lucent Technologies]. September 1992 to January 1994. Post-doctoral Member of Technical Staff. Created models, software (C/Mathematica/Postscript, on UNIX), oral presentations, and technical documentation (TEX) for research on physical properties of defects and glasses. Three published papers.
Laboratory of Atomic and Solid-State Physics, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY. June 1990 to September 1992. Graduate Research Assistant. Created models, software (C/Mathematica, on UNIX), oral presentations, and technical documents (TEX) for research on the physics of crack growth. One published paper.
Physics Department, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY. Fall 1989 and Fall 1990. Teaching Assistant. Taught laboratory and discussion sessions, graded homework and exams, and held office hours for Physics for Poets and Honors Engineering Physics.
Physics Department, University of Washington, Seattle, WA. June 1987 to April 1988. Undergraduate Research Assistant. Created models, software (FORTRAN, on VMS), and technical documents (TEX) for atomic physics research. One published paper.
Rapid Systems, Inc., Seattle, WA May 1986 to September 1987. Electronics Technician. Tested electronics and developed test software (QuickBasic/Pascal on MS-DOS) for data acquisition computer peripherals.
Volunteer Positions
Kiva, online. June 2024 to present. Spanish translator/editor. Translate loan descriptions from Spanish into English, edit for clarity, and verify adherence to guidelines for Kiva's crowd-sourced micro-lending program.
Smithsonian Transcription Center, online. May 2024 to present. Transcriber. Transcribe scans of hand-written documents from the Smithsonian museum collections.
Learn to Be, online. February 2023 to present. Tutor. Tutor disadvantaged youth and young adults in math and computer programming.
Washington Trails Association. 2008 to present. Currently Outreach Volunteer. Previously, Assistant Crew Leader, Trail Crew Volunteer. In my current role at Washington Trails Association (WTA), I write trip reports for hiking trails and staff outreach events to educate the public about WTA and trails. Between April 2018 and December 2023 as an assistant crew leader (ACL), I mentored and trained volunteers to improve and build hiking trails on public lands in Washington state, and made sure the volunteers were being safe and having fun. As an ACL and previously as a trail crew volunteer, I used hand tools (cross-cut saws, picks, grub hoes, etc.) to improve and maintain hiking trails; I recorded more than 100 days of trail work.
American Red Cross, Greater Inland Northwest Chapter, Spokane, WA. July 2021 to March 2024. Disaster Services Volunteer. Maintained database of emergency shelter locations. Staffed emergency shelters. Performed recovery case work for people affected by disasters.
Drupal Project (open-source web content management system), online. June 2009 to September 2021. Project Volunteer. Served as documentation team leader and co-leader for the Drupal project, and Drupal Core API Documentation Maintainer. Maintained the Drupal User Guide and several contributed modules. Wrote and edited documentation for Drupal. Created and maintained modules. Helped others learn how to use Drupal. Fixed bugs in and added features to the core Drupal software.
WordPress Project (open-source blogging software), online. January 2007 to September 2021. Project Volunteer. Reorganized and rewrote the developer-oriented documentation of WordPress, and fixed bugs in the WordPress software. Organized a Seattle WordPress developer group. Maintained one free WordPress plugin.
Washington CASH, Seattle, WA. April 2005 to February 2007. Excel Consultant and Technology Instructor. Improved and updated spreadsheets used by clients of business micro-lending program. Taught classes in Excel and basic business accounting.
American Red Cross, King and Kitsap County Chapter, Seattle, WA. May 2003 to April 2011. Spanish Interpreter and Translator. Interpreted (spoken) and translated (written) between Spanish and English, for local non-profit groups and individuals, as part of the chapter's "Language Bank" service.
Literacy Source, Seattle, WA. October 2002 to June 2007. English as a Second Language Teacher. Taught ESL classes at all levels from beginning to advanced, facilitated "Talk-Time" conversation practice classes, developed lessons and curriculum for weekly classes, and acted as a roving substitute teacher.
Centro de Intercambio y Solidaridad (Center for Interchange and Solidarity), San Salvador, El Salvador. January to March 2000. English as a Second Language Teacher and general volunteer. Developed lessons and taught 8-week beginning-level English as a Foreign Language class. Completed teacher training. Created queries for database of hurricane Mitch damage (Access/SQL). Helped organize election observing program.
BikeWorks, Seattle, WA. April 1998 to April 2003. Mentor and general volunteer. Mentored youth enrolled in an Earn-a-bike program. Also occasionally participated in adult bicycle repair sessions, inspected bicycles at bicycle swap events, and staffed information tables at events.
CASA Latina, Seattle, WA. September 1997 to July 2002. English as a Second Language Teacher. Taught adult English as a Second Language classes; developed curriculum. Completed teacher training courses.