instructor biographies

Jeff Carlen

Mr. Carlen holds a Bachelor of Science from S.U.N.Y. College of Forestry and a Master of Science in Photogrammetry from Syracuse University. In addition to being a Professional Surveyor and Mapper he is a Certified Photogrammetrist (American Society of Photogrammetry & Remote Sensing) and a Certified Hydrographer, Inshore and Offshore, (American Congress on Surveying and Mapping).

During his twenty four years as a commissioned officer in the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) he served on steel tower triangulation parties in New York and Texas, led first-order leveling teams throughout the mid-continent area and performed super precise crustal movement studies in California and Alaska. His sea duty assignments included four NOAA ships conducting hydrographic and oceanographic surveys in Long Island Sound, the Atlantic, Pacific and Caribbean. He commanded the NOAA Ships WHITING and RESEARCHER. While operating off the coast of Peru the RESEARCHER discovered the first indications of the 1984 El Nino.

Jeff was Chief of NOAA’s photogrammetric and hydrographic processing office in Norfolk, Virginia. He served as the geodetic survey advisor to the U. S. Army Field Artillery School and Fort Sill where he was awarded the Order of St. Barbara, and was the National Ocean Service Advisor to the State of Florida.

After completing service in NOAA Jeff developed and implemented a course of study in land surveying at Florida A&M University which was approved by the Florida Board of Professional Surveyors and Mappers, and taught surveying for eleven years. Jeff now restricts his activities to a small private practice of consulting, surveying and writing.

Evan Brown

Evan Brown is a licensed Surveyor Photogrammetrist by the Commonwealth of Virginia and a Certified Photogrammetrist by the American Society for Photogrammetry and Remote Sensing. Mr. Brown has 15 years of geospatial experience in the public and private sectors including work on projects in Photogrammetry, GPS, GIS, and LIDAR. Mr. Brown is a graduate of the University of Florida with a bachelor’s degree in Geography and is currently pursuing a master’s degree in Geomatics also from the University of Florida.

George M. Cole

George M. Cole is a surveyor and engineer with a lengthy background in surveying and mapping. His career has included worldwide hydrographic and geodetic surveys as a commissioned officer of the U.S. Coast & Geodetic Survey (now NOAA); service as the State Cadastral Surveyor of Florida; many years directing private surveying firms in Florida and LiDAR mapping projects in Latin America; and service as a professor of surveying and mapping at the University of Puerto Rico. Dr. Cole has served as technical advisor to several states on boundary issues; and has provided expert testimony to a number of local, state and federal courts. He also has made significant contributions to professional literature and is the author of several surveying textbooks (with notable examples being Water Boundaries, John Wiley & Sons, 1996 and Surveyor Reference Manual, Professional Publications, 2009), law review articles, and research papers in professional journals. Cole holds a bachelor of science degree in mathematics from Tulane University as well as master of science and doctor of philosophy degrees in geography from Florida State University.

Michael Dooner

Michael Dooner is a Professional Certified Forester. A native of Florida and a 1980 graduate of the University of Florida School of Forest Resources and Conservation, Mr. Dooner has been engaged in natural resource and forestry consulting for thirty years. As President of Southern Forestry Consultants, Inc., he manages operations in virtually all Southern states from offices in Monticello, Florida, Bainbridge, Georgia, and Enterprise, Alabama. Mr. Dooner serves on the Boards of the Florida Forestry Association and Florida Farm Bureau Federation.

W. Lamar Evers, PLS.

Lamar Evers, PLS, is a Professional Land surveyor registered in Alabama, Florida, Mississippi and North Carolina. He is employed by the Florida Department of Environmental Regulation, Division of State Lands, Bureau of Survey and Mapping as the Mean High Water (MHW) and LABINS Program Manager. As the MHW program manager, his responsibilities include the dissemination of Mean High Water data, establishing procedures for the determination of the MHW line when a study is required and issuance of notices of filing of MWH surveys as required by Chapter 177, Part II, Florida Statutes. Other responsibilities include the review of various surveys dealing with the sale, purchase, use or lease of lands of the State of Florida, management of the LABINS program and the state USGS digital mapping program.

Lamar is a Life Member of the Florida Surveying and Mapping Society (FSMS), a member of the American Association for Geodetic Surveying, American Society of Photogrammetry and Remote Sensing and a Fellow Member of the National Society of Professional Surveyors. He has served as Vice President, President-Elect, President and Immediate Past President of FSMS. As NSPS Governor for FSMS, he served as Secretary and Chairman of the NSPS Board of Governors and the NSPS Area 4 Director. He has served on the Department of Natural Resources Public Land Survey Advisory Board, Collier County Stormwater Management Advisory Board, Golden Gate Estates Land Trust Advisory Committee, Edison Community College Technical Advisory Committee and the Troy University Geomatics Advisory Board.

He is the Bureau’s representative to the Department of Business and Professional Regulation, Board of Professional Surveyors and Mappers meetings. Also, he is the contact for the continuing education needs for the 15 professional surveyors and mappers on staff. Lamar has taught continuing education courses for surveyors and mappers, attorneys and real estate professionals and has been qualified as an expert witness in land surveying matters in state and federal courts.

Angelo M. Ferrari, Ph.D.

Mr. Ferrari, was born in Argentina in 1934. He is married and has three children and three grandchildren.

Education

Three years of Civil Engineering (incomplete, no degree) National University of Buenos Aires, Argentina;

MS in Physics (1959) National University of Cuyo, Argentina;

PhD in Nuclear Engineering (1991), University of FL, Gainesville, FL

Professional History

1991- Present, Professor of Physics, Santa Fe Community College, Gainesville, FL

1973-1985, Independent sales representative for research, medical, and industrial instrumentation.

1970-1973, Consulting Engineering for Nuclear Instrumentation group, Combustion Engineering, Windsor, Connecticut

1964-1970, V.P. of Engineering, Tennelec, Inc., Oak Ridge, Tennessee

1960-1961, Research Assistant at University of Rochester, Rochester, New York and Oak Ridge National Laboratory, Oak Ridge, Tennessee

1962-1963, Researcher and professor with the Argentine Atomic Energy Commission.

When an engineering student worked as a surveyor in the construction of National Highway #3, in Patagonia, Argentina.

Michael Garcia, PSM

Mr. Michael F. Garcia, PSM, is a licensed Florida Professional Surveyor and Mapper. A native of Florida with nearly 30 years of experience, his diverse background includes Boundary and Topographic Surveys, Right of Way Mapping, Control Networks and GIS data applications. Mr. Garcia has been employed by Seminole County Government for 18 years and is currently a Project Manager with the County's Engineering Division, lending his expertise to a variety of projects. He is a member of the Florida Surveying and Mapping Society and the Central Florida GIS Users Group as well as a Past President of the “Great” Central Florida Chapter..

Larry Kryske, Commander, U.S. Navy (Ret.)

Larry works with people who want to create their finest hour and with organizations that want to be more successful. He has over thirty years of worldwide success leading men and women and building unstoppable teams. He was a career naval officer, private school administrator, and strategic planner. He is President of Homeport Speaking and Seminars, a full-service leadership firm. He speaks nationwide on leadership, teamwork, and productivity. He has worked with clients in over 50 different industries including surveyors in Alabama, Mississippi, Texas and California. Commander Kryske has a Bachelor of Arts Degree in Astronomy in 1971 from the University of California at Los Angeles (UCLA) and a Master of Science Degree in Applied Science in 1978 from the Naval Postgraduate School in Monterey, California. He is a graduate of 830 hours of continuing education in quality improvement, communications, marketing, customer relations, and productivity (1990-2005), a graduate of Carlson Learning Company Instrumented Learning Certification Program (1995), a graduate of Deming Quality Improvement Program (1990), and a graduate of over 3,500 hours of Navy technical, leadership, and management training courses (1971-1993). Commander Kryske is author of the leadership book, The Churchill Factors: Creating Your Finest Hour and the leadership and teamwork book, The Greatest Board in the World.

Gary Kent, PSM

Mr. Kent is Director of Integrated Services at The Schneider Corporation, a surveying, engineering and GIS firm based in Indianapolis. He serves on Schneider’s leadership council and his responsibilities include training, coaching and mentoring the surveying staff. Mr. Kent is a graduate of Purdue University with a B.S. in Land Surveying and is registered to practice land surveying in Indiana and Michigan. He is chair of the Committee on ALTA/ACSM Standards for both ACSM/NSPS and for the American Land Title Association. He is also Past-President of both the American Congress on Surveying and Mapping (2001) and the Indiana Society of Professional Land Surveyors (1989). A member of the adjunct faculty at Purdue University from 1999-2006, Mr. Kent taught Boundary Law, Legal Descriptions, Property Surveying and Land Survey Systems. He has received two “Excellence in Teaching Awards” since he started teaching in 1999.

Scot Smith

Mr. Smith received his Ph.D. from the University of Michigan in 1982. He has been at University of Florida since 1989. Before coming to Florida, Scot was at Kodak and before that, he was a professor at Ohio State.

Mr. Smith became a registered surveyor and mapper in Florida in 1995. His expertise is primarily in remote sensing, but also teaches GIS classes.

Current research activities are a wildlife habitat-mapping project of Florida for the US Fish and Wildlife Department, site analysis in Sinai, Egypt and a study of the impact of a new dam on the Danube River in Hungary. Scot has a new project funded by NATO to investigate the use of zeolites for treating wastewater in Hungary.

R. Thomas Snow, PSM

Mr. Snow, PSM, is a Florida Professional Surveyor and Mapper with over 17 years of surveying experience. Tom received an Associate of Science Degree from Valencia Community College in Orlando, Florida in 1992 and became a Florida Professional Surveyor and Mapper in 1996. In June of 2000 Tom received his license in Georgia. Tom has a wide range of surveying experience including Boundary and Topographic Surveys, Construction Layout, Sectional Surveys, Right of Way Surveys, GPS Surveying and GIS Mapping. With his interest in education, Tom taught at Valencia Community College from 1997 - 2001 as an Adjunct Instructor in the Surveying and Mapping Program. He has taught at the Seminole Community College from May 2001 to the present and is an instructor for Continuing Education Seminars for the Florida Surveying and Mapping Society (FSMS). Tom has received the following awards:

In 1999 the Central Florida Chapter of FSMS Surveyor of the Year Award
In 2000 the FSMS Chapter President of the Year
In 2001 the FSMS Presidents Award for Outstanding Contributions
In 2002 the FSMS Jim Bennet Board Member of the Year

Michael J. Whitling, PSM

Mr. Whitling has been a licensed surveyor and mapper in Florida since 1989. He began his surveying career in 1975 and is currently the County Surveyor for Dade County.

During his career he has served as President of the Dade County Chapter of Florida Survey and Mapping Society. He is currently the State Director for District # 7. Additionally he serves on the Surveying and Mapping Council and Education Committee for FSMS.

Mr. Whitling recently chaired the Surveying Committee for the Education Workforce Development Curriculum Restructuring meeting held in Tampa in July. He is also an instructor at Miami-Dade Community College. He began teaching courses there in 1989.