William R. Wiley - 1994 Black Engineer of the Year

Chapter 8 Dr. William Wiley 1994 Black Engineer of the Year

THEFOLLOWINGARTICLE, WRITTENBY MELINDA COOKE, WASFIRST PUBLISHEDIN US BLACK ENGINEER & IT, CONFERENCE ISSUE 1994.

Bill Wiley has spent a lifetime figuring out how to make technology work for people. Dr. Wiley is the principal executive in the Northwest for the Battelle Memorial Institute, an independent, worldwide, science-based organization dedicated to “putting technology to work.”

Wiley’s responsibilities include research, development, and technology commercialization at the U.S. Dept. of Energy’s Pacific Northwest Laboratory, as well as Battelle’s Marine Sciences Laboratory in Sequim and the Seattle Research Center. Wiley, 60, who holds a doctorate in bacteriology, supervises more than 4,000 scientists, engineers, and technical specialists doing research in support of DOE missions in environment, energy, defense and national security, economic competitiveness, and education. The lab is also participating in the 30-year, $1-billion per year cleanup of the nearby Hanford site. Born in Oxford, Miss., Wiley graduated from Tougaloo College with a degree in chemistry. After serving in the U.S. Army, he attended the University of Illinois at Urbana under a Rockefeller Foundation scholarship. At Illinois, he received his master’s degree in microbiology in 1960. He then went on to obtain a doctorate in bacteriology from Washington State University in Pullman. He started his career with Battelle in 1965 as a research scientist at the Pacific Nothwest Laboratory. In 1979, he was promoted to director of research, and occupied that position until 1984, when he became laboratory director. Wiley is presently responsible for the business operations of Battelle’s Pacific Northwest Division, which has operated PNL for DOE since 1965. As a result of his vision, PNL is becoming a major

center for science and technology in the Northwest. Wiley feels that the future of this country’s economic growth needs to come from research institutions like PNL. Many leading experts in infrastructure and economic policy agree that scientific research facilities like the DOE national labs will play a major role in America’s economic development. “The national labs have an existing research infrastructure that is ready to contribute advanced technologies for the seven or eight new industries that will be the basis of future economic growth,” said Wiley in an interview following his participation in President Clinton’s fall 1992 economic summit.

As a boy in Mississippi, Wiley had dreams of becoming a doctor. He realized at an early age that this vision could only be achieved through education. He continues to believe that investment in education is one prescription for America’s healing. “Think of it in business terms,” Wiley says. “It’s a long-term investment that is bound to result in a net gain. To this end, Wiley has served on many local and regional task forces aimed at developing long-term educational goals for the minority community. To encourage more minority students to pursue careers in science, he helped create programs at PNL that will support more than 100 African-American students this year. These students will participate in education and research activities at the lab under the mentorship of experienced scientists and engineers. Wiley also puts his philosophy to work by sending Battelle’s scientists and engineers into classrooms to be role models to students. Through his Adopt-aTeacher program, teachers can spend a summer observing and participating in research projects and can take their newfound knowledge back to their students.

His solid reputation as a scientist and an administrator has led many groups to seek Wiley’s advice. He was selected to join the 61person group helping Washington governor Mike Lowry to plan for his administration. Wiley is the first national laboratory director to be a member of the Council of the Government-University-Industry Research Roundtable, which reports directly to the presidents of the National Academies of Sciences and Engineering and the Institute of Medicine. He is president of the Washington State Board of Regents and a member of the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center Board

of Trustees, and the Southern University Engineering Executive Committee.

As an award presenter at last year’s Black Engineer of the Year Awards conference, Wiley saw firsthand its benefits to the Black community and the country at large. “The real value of the Black Engineer of the Year Awards,” he says, “is the impact that it must have on students and young professionals starting their careers in very large corporate organizations. The conference is important to the country because it promotes visible demonstrations of how diversity in the work place contributes to the bottom line of American companies.” But it is in the Black community that he sees its most important effect. “Wide distribution of the proceedings to counselors of high schools,” Wiley says, “in predominantly Black communities, could give help and guidance to the careers of otherwise delinquent youth.” Wiley’s vision to tap into America’s education and research resource facilities and stimulate economic growth by forming an alliance with cuttingedge industries is now embedded in the mainstream business philosophy that has been endorsed by President Clinton. It seems as though the Mississippi boy who once wanted to write prescriptions may have helped pioneer a cure for some of America’s most pressing economic ills. Innovation is the true mark of this pioneer’s life and works, one that makes him the embodiment of the Black Engineer of the Year.

DR. WILLIAM WILEY, MICROBIOLOGIST, EDUCATOR, BATTELLE MEMORIAL INSTITUTE VICE PRESIDENT, AND BLACK ENGINEER OF THE YEARIN 1994, WAS “ALIFELONGBELIEVERINTHEABILITYOFRESEARCH ACTIVITIESTODRIVEECONOMICDEVELOPMENTAND, THROUGHIT, TO CHANGE PEOPLE’S LIVES.” AS THE PRINCIPAL EXECUTIVE IN THE NORTHWESTFOR BATTELLE—SUPERVISING 4,000 SCIENTISTS, ENGINEERS, ANDTECHNICALSPECIALISTS—HEDEVOTEDHISENERGIESTOFIGURING OUTHOWTOMAKETECHNOLOGYWORKFORPEOPLE. DR. WILEYDIEDAT HISHOMEIN RICHLAND, WASH., ON JUNE 30, 1996.