ASQ - Education Division

Division Leadership

Chair

Dr. Cindy Veenstra, Veenstra and Associates, consults with colleges and conducts research in engineering and STEM education. She has extensive experience in teaching quality both in a university and as a trainer, and in leading K-12 outreach activities. Prior to chairing the division, Cindy's positions in the Education Division leadership included chair-elect and chair of its K-12 and higher education activities. She is also an associate editor of the division's new journal, Quality Approaches in Higher Education. In addition, as a past ASQ section chair, she has led community- level education efforts.

Dr. Veenstra holds a PH.D. from the University of Michigan and is as ASQ Fellow. She has published her research in leading journals. Cindy's editorial in the latest issue of the Quality Approaches in Higher Education reflects some of her thoughts on STEM education. Cindy sees quality of education as a collaborative effort for improving student success for ALL students. She is a strong proponent of Baldrige systems thinking in education and the use of classroom PDSA quality tools. Feel free to contact her with your questions about the Education Division!

Chair-elect

Fernando F. Padro
fpadro@msn.com

Dr. Fernando Padro is an associate professor at Cambridge College in Education Leadership. He specilaizes in quality assurance through accreditation and audit processes and has authored several papers on global accreditation issues. With a dissertation on the presence of quality circles in educational systems, he has conducted research in this area for more than 25 years. He has made numerous presentations in Europe and Australia about key issues on implementing quality initiatives at colleges and universities from the points of view of faculty participation and organizational response to meeting external expectations. He has been a Baldrige Examiner for four years and has served as a Peer Reviewer for The Higher Learning Commission's Project AQIP. He is on the editorial board of TQM Magazine and has been elected Faculty Fellow for the NASPA. He is a senor member of ASQ and chairs the Higher Education Advisory Committee. Dr. Padro has published articles in ASQ's Journal for Quality and Participation and the ASQ Higher Education Brief.

Secretary

Teri Reed-Rhoads
trhoads@purdue.edu

Dr.Teri Reed-Rhoads is the Assistant Dean of Engineering for Undergraduate Education and Associate Professor of Engineering Education at Purdue University.

Treasurer

Ardith Beitel
ardith.m.beitel@boeing.com

Ardith Beitel is an Internal Auditor for Boeing Test and Evaluation based in Seattle. Her work life is in manufacturing QA, predominately in automotive, with print/packaging and now aerospace to the mix. Her favorite quality areas are prototype quality, training and auditing.

She is a senior member of ASQ and has served extensively as a volunteer leader in ASQ.She had the pleasure to teach at a college level and share quality principles with an entire countywide consolidated school district while in Detroit, all thanks to ASQ volunteering. (Just a shameless plug for this great professional community!) She taught two classes; Quality Management and Teamwork and Problem Solving. In addition, she has provided on-the-job training, informally and in classes to her co-workers, giving her insight to the successful skills required for workforce training.

Her desire to be in this leadership position in the Education Division comes from an innate desire to spread knowledge as part of the ASQ professional community. Ardith’s insight: “Our field is relatively young and still searching for acceptance in many industries. We have so much to offer society and it all begins with understanding. I believe if we have the correct tools and dynamic ability to adapt their applications we can truly increase the quality of life in the world.”

K-12 Quality Systems Chair

J. Jay Marino
jmarino@dunlapcusd.net

Dr. Jay Marino is the Superintendent of schools in the Dunlap Community Unit School District 323 in Dunlap, IL. He received his Bachelor’s Degree in Elementary Education from the University of Northern Iowa; Masters Degree in Educational Administration from Arizona State University; Educational Specialists and Doctorate Degree from Western Illinois University. Jay has led continuous improvement initiatives as an elementary and middle school teacher, elementary school administrator, Special Education Coordinator, Director of Technology, Director of Instruction and Assistant Superintendent. In addition, Jay serves as an international consultant assisting American and European school organizations in their continuous improvement efforts.

Jay has delivered key note presentations at local, state, national and international conferences. He has served regionally as the Chair of the Iowa Quality Center’s Advisory Council and nationally as the Chair of the American Society for Quality (ASQ) K-12 Educational Advisory Committee. Jay has been actively involved in State Quality Award programs as an applicant and an examiner and has assisted in obtaining State Quality Award recognition for school districts in which he has worked in both Iowa and Illinois. He has authored a number of articles and served as an editor. He authored the book Quality across the curriculum; Integrating quality tools and PDSA with Standards. Jay was the first moderator of the national Quality in Education blog hosted by the American Society for Quality designed to promote continuous improvement in education. His personal website is at http://www.jaymarino.me/

K-12 Classroom Tools Chair

Becky Martin
martin@cr.k12.ia.us

Becky Martin is the Continuous Improvement Facilitator for the Cedar Rapids Community School District (Iowa). Becky received her Bachelor's Degree in Education from the University of Wisconsin-Stout; Masters Degree from Iowa State University and has thirty-six years experience in education and has been working specifically with continuous improvement for the last sixteen years. She has served as a consultant assisting schools in their continuous improvement and organizational change efforts and is a certified ASQ ImpaQT trainer. Becky has delivered presentations at local, state and national conferences including but not limited to National Quality in Education, ASCD, and NSBA and has authored articles in leading education publications. She also hosts the Quality in Education blog for the ASQ Education Division.

Higher Education Quality Systems Chair

Julie A. Furst-Bowe
Furst-bowej@uwstout.edu

Dr. Julie A. Furst-Bowe is the Provost and Vice Chancellor for Academic and Student Affairs at the University of Wisconsin-Stout. She provides leadership to the nationally-recognized quality improvement program at UW-Stout and has served as a senior examiner for the Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award Program. UW-Stout was the first higher education institution to receive the prestigious Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award. She is currently a judge for the state quality awards programs in Wisconsin and Minnesota and serves on the panel of reviewers for the Higher Learning Commission’s Academic Quality Improvement Program.

She is recognized nationally and internationally for her expertise in quality in higher education and has authored several articles and a book on this topic, Quality and Performance Excellence in Higher Education. She is an editor of the International Journal of Excellence in Education, a journal dedicated to quality in higher education. Julie currently serves on the Executive Board for the National Consortium for Continuous Improvement in Higher Education and also serves on the Board of Directors for the Wisconsin Center for Performance Excellence, Sacred Heart Hospital and the Stout Technology Park. She has served as a quality improvement consultant for numerous colleges and universities and is currently under contract to provide consulting services to Singapore’s Ministry of Education and Ahlia University in Bahrain.

Prior to becoming Provost at UW-Stout, Julie served as a faculty member, department chair, assessment coordinator and associate vice chancellor at UW-Stout. She holds a doctorate in education from the University of Minnesota.

Workforce Development Chair

Tom Berstene
tberstene@workforceplanning.com

QED (Division Newsletter) Editor

Marianne Di Pierro
marianne.dipierro@wmich.edu

Dr. Marianne Di Pierro has been a member of the Graduate College at Western Michigan University (WMU) for eight years, serving as Director of the Graduate Center for Research and Retention. The Graduate Center is an innovative one-of-a-kind entity that provides sustained one-on-one mentoring, guidance, and advising support to graduate students in all disciplines. The Center represents an integrated approach to retention, conducts research on time to degree and attrition, participates in national research initiatives in graduate education that ensure best practices, and implements programmatic interventions to enhance opportunities for graduate degree completion. Di Pierro is also a conflict resolution strategist, serving the needs of graduate students and graduate advising faculty at WMU.

She holds the Ph.D. in English from the University of South Florida. She was elected by the national membership of the Modern Language Association to the Delegate Assembly for a three-year term as a special-interest delegate, representing independent scholars and professionals with alternative careers. Di Pierro has published in the ASQ Journal for Quality and Participation, as well as ASQ's Higher Education Brief and is also an editorial reviewer for JQP. She currently serves as advising editor to ASQ's Higher Education Brief and also as ASQ Newsletter Editor.

Website Liaison and Membership Chair

(This position is temporarily held by Cindy Veenstra)

Cindy Veenstra
cpveenst@umich.edu

Financial Audit Chair

John Dew
jdew@aalan.ua.edu

Dr. John Dew is currently associate vice chancellor for Troy University in Alabama, where he is responsible for accreditation efforts, institutional research, quality improvement, strategic planning, and will be the university's representative to the Alabama Commission on Higher Education. He also teaches three online courses in the University of Alabama's Master's degree in Consumer Quality Management. He is past chair of the Education Division and an ASQ Fellow. He has published articles in ASQ's Quality Progress, ASQ's Journal for Quality and Participation, the ASQ Higher Education Brief, and the division's newsletter.

Editor, Quality Approaches in Higher Education and Workplace Development Brief

Deborah Hopen
debhopen@nventure.com

Deborah Hopen has over 30 years of experience in total quality management. She has served as a senior executive with experience in general management, quality assurance and quality control, training, human resources, organization development, research and development, process engineering, and accounting. She has been president and chairman of the American Society for Quality and currently is the editor of ASQ's Journal for Quality and Participation and contributing editor of ASQ's Six Sigma Forum magazine.

Nominating Committee Chair

Cindy Veenstra (see Chair for contact information)

Examining Chair

Don Brecken
www.ferris.edu/statewide

Don Brecken is Instructor/Business Program Advisor for Ferris State University in Grand Rapids, MI. Don is also Director of Quality for Commercial Tool & Die, Inc. located in Comstock Park, MI. His background includes quality leadership, higher education, continuous improvement, operations learning and development, management consulting, quality auditing, and management system implementation.

Don is a Fellow of the American Society for Quality (ASQ), past Chair of ASQ Section 1001 (Grand Rapids), Deputy Regional Director for ASQ Region 10, and served on the Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award Board of Examiners in '04, '05, and '07. He is an ASQ Certified Manager of Quality and Orgnaization Excellence (CMQ/OE) and RAB/QSA Certified Business Improvement Auditor (QMS-BI).

Don earned his MBA in Strategic Management from Davenport University’s Sneden Graduate School. He has three undergraduate degrees in business with a Technical Specialty in Quality Leadership.

Don also instructs graduate and undergraduate courses in quality management, strategic management, operations management, and leadership at Davenport and Ferris State Universities.

Standards Representative(non-voting)

F. Craig Johnson
Dr. Craig Johnson is a fellow of the American Society for Quality and the chair of the ASQ Standards Committee. Craig heads the US delegation to the International Standards Organization's Technical Committee 176 for Quality management and quality assurance (Subcommittee 1 on concepts and terminology). He is co-convener of the ISO TC 176 Study Group on education. He is the second recipient of the American National Standards Group's Honorary Lifetime Membership Award for his "outstanding professional achievements on behalf of our nation's international standards activities."

Division Immediate Past Chair

Scott Martens
Scott Martens served as past chair from July 2010 to June 2011. Since June 2004, Scott has served as director - Office of Service & Continuous Improvement at University of Minnesota. In this position, Scott is leading the financial, operational and cultural transformation of the University of Minnesota in direct support of strategic positioning efforts. Since 2000 he has also been a senior lecturer for the University of Minnesota's Carlson School of Management in both the operations and accounting departments teaching MBA and undergraduate courses in operations, quality management and managerial accounting. Scott earned an MS-management with distinction from the Naval Postgraduate School in Monterey, CA and a BBA-accounting with honors from Iowa State University in Ames, IA. Scott is both a CPA and CPL, certified professional logistician.