Board Member Bios
Chair — Steve Schade
sschade@ambitech.com
Steve Schade is a Senior Engineer at Valdes Engineering, which he joined in 2011, working primarily on projects for clients in the petroleum industry. Previously he was employed at UOP, specializing in aromatics processes. Earlier in his career he was involved in process development work with IGT, Searle, and USG. Steve has BS and MS degrees in Chemical Engineering from the University of Missouri at Rolla (now Missouri University of Science & Technology). He has been active on the AIChE section Student Outreach committee, giving presentations at schools and helping prepare displays for Chemistry Day and Engineers Week.
Chair Elect — Peter Hereña
pgherena@yahoo.com
Mr. Hereña has twelve years of experience in the design and installation of control systems and the implementation of safety instrumented systems for the process industries. Mr. Hereña is a Senior Consultant at Baker Risk Consultants and is responsible for facilitating HAZOP and SIL Selection. Additionally, he has extensive experience in engineered safeguard design basis development and verification/validation projects. Mr. Hereña began his career with UOP, a licensor of process units to the petroleum and petrochemical industries, where he performed field verification of control systems at customer sites, and designed and managed development of custom control projects. Mr. Hereña is involved in the leadership of International Society of Automation (ISA) Chicago. In FY 2010-2011, he was AIChE Chicago Section Vice-Chair Programming. In FY 2009-2010, he was co-Secretary.
Vice-Chair Program — Dan Rusinak
Rusinad@Middough.com
Daniel Rusinak, PE, is Chief Process Engineer at Middough, Inc, Chicago office. He has over 35 years of professional engineering experience in development, design, construction and operations of specialty, polymer, and fine chemical plants. Dan has served the AIChE Chicago Section as House Committee Chair for the past two years.
Treasurer — Mike Buettner
Mike.Buettner@alfalaval.com
Mike Buettner is a Sales and Market Development Manager for the Midwest in Alfa Laval’s
Energy and Industrial group. He holds a BSChE from Michigan Technological University and an
MBA focused on Operations from the University of Minnesota. Mike has over 15 years of
experience in the process industry, 10 of those years have been in the oil refining industry. For
the past 5 years, he has brought engineered solutions to that same customer base.
Mike has been a member of AIChE in the past, and recently become active in the Chicago chapter. He looks forward to meeting all of the members and continuing the success this chapter has seen in recent years.
The majority of Mike’s free time is spent on the demands of trying to raise three very active children in Yorkville.
Secretary — Jerry Wilks
gwilks@citgo.com
Jerry Wilks is a senior metallurgy and corrosion engineer at the CITGO Lemont refinery since 2005. Prior to that Jerry has been a US Air Force officer and also worked at different engineering position at AMOCO and BP Naperville campus and Whiting refinery. He has a BS in Metallurgical Engineering and two masters degree in Materials Engineering and Chemical Engineering all from IIT in Chicago. Jerry holds three US patents and is the author of several publications. He has served as the secretary and vice-chair program of the AIChE Chicago section and has been a contributor and organizer of the AIChE midwest regional conferences since 2006.
Director at Large — Annette Johnston
Annette.Johnston@abbott.com
Annette Johnston has been active with the Chicago Section since 1996, when she coordinated
the Session Aides for the Annual Meeting that year. She has held several positions in the
Section, including Session Chair. She is a fellow of AIChE. Recently, she was the Meeting
Program Chair of the Spring National Meeting in Tampa, FL in 2009. She is currently the
Chair of Research and New Technology Committee. Annette manages a Process Engineering
Group in Abbott Diagnostics Division. She has worked at Abbott Laboratories for over 20
years in various positions. Prior to that, she worked at Monsanto Company in St. Louis.
Annette received her BS ChemE degree from the University of Illinois at Urbana, and
BA Chemistry from Knox College.
Director at Large — Jeff Umbach
jumbach@ambitech.com
Director at Large — Bill Glogowski
glogowwk@middough.com
Bill Glogowski is a Process Engineer with Middough in Oak Brook, joining in 2006 soon after receiving a BS in Chemical Engineering from the University of Illinois at Chicago and passing the fundamentals of engineering exam. In his current position, he is involved in process design in industries such as refining, consumer products, and pharmaceuticals. He was an active member in the student AICHE chapter at UIC and is now an active participant in the Section’s Young Professional Advisory Board.
Past Chair — Steve Rosenblum
Steve.Rosenblum@uop.com
Steve Rosenblum is a Senior Applications Specialist at UOP where he supports all simulation products at UOP and creates tools to help UOP engineering with its work processes. He has been a member of AIChE since 1977. He has been active in the Chicago section since 2005 where he took on the role as membership chairman. Steve has a Bachelor of Science degree in Chemical Engineering from Cornell University and a Masters of Science degree in Chemical Engineering from Northeastern University. Steve previously worked for Badger Engineering as a design engineer, and ABB Simcon as a dynamic simulation and optimization engineer prior to joining UOP in 1997.