Connie Muncy earned her master of enviornmental, safety and health management degree in 2001.
As an undergraduate chemistry major, Connie Muncy was
leaning toward a career as a perfume chemist.
Ironically, since earning a master’s degree in environmental, safety and
health management from The University of Findlay, she has had the experience of
managing safety for solid waste and water reclamation services. Not exactly
Chanel No. 5, but more challenging and more impactful.
“I cannot begin to say how very fulfilling and worthwhile this
career has been for me,” said Muncy. “If
you only save one person over the course of a lifetime career, you have made a
difference in this world!”
“I realized that I needed to be around multitudes of people
to be happy,” Muncy added, “so working alone in a lab just wasn’t going to be
my cup of tea.”
People and Policy
Connie had heard about The University of Findlay’s graduate
program in environmental, safety and health management and felt it might be a
path to a career working with people and science. She
completed the requirements for a master of science degree in 2001 and began
making her mark on the world of workplace safety.
Describing “life after a graduate degree,” Muncy felt she
became very well rounded with experience in safety, industrial hygiene,
environmental management, worker’s compensation and other areas. Currently, she works as an industrial
hygienist at Concurrent Technologies Corporation (CTC), a non-profit
organization that performs scientific research and development. CTC also
supports a number of Department of Defense programs.
UF Convenient for Professionals
As far as Muncy is concerned, the letters “UF” could also
stand for “user friendly.”
She felt she received a lot of personal attention from
faculty and staff at The University of Findlay, a real benefit for students who
are also employed full time.
“Earning a graduate degree from UF added profoundly to my
knowledge and marketability,” she stated.
“I have applied a good majority of the valuable information gained
during the environmental, safety and health management program.”
In fact, Muncy, who has just been selected to receive the
Affiliate Societies Council of Dayton’s (ASC) Outstanding Engineers and
Scientists Award for 2012 for Technical Leadership, explained that this award
is truly a reflection of the well-rounded education she received at UF.
She also recalled that faculty and staff were helpful with
career advice and sometimes just moral support.
“They really cared about us as students and wanted us to
succeed, and it showed.”
Completing a portion of her classes online and the rest in a
classroom setting worked extremely well for Muncy. She felt that online training was an
effective platform for environmental, safety and health and was very aware of
the convenience it provided for a busy professional.
According to Dr. Timothy Murphy, the mission of the program
is to provide students with the skills to make managerial decisions and provide
leadership in environmental, safety and health careers. Murphy is the department chair and an
associate professor. He added that the
graduate program equips students with skills in the areas of business
knowledge, analysis, management, technical knowledge, and the ability to
integrate all of these skills into effective actions and leadership.
A great program for
women
Almost ecstatically happy with her career choice, Muncy encourages
women to seriously consider a career in an environmental field. She sees an increasing number of women in her
occupation and said there are mentoring organizations and support groups,
including the American Society of Safety Engineer’s Women in Safety Engineering
(WISE). This same group has added her
name to their list of “100 Women in Safety Engineering Making a
Difference.” It’s an appropriate
accolade, considering that making a difference is what she has always wanted to
do!