AIH Call For Articles | Winter 2022 Edition

The next issue of the AIH Bulletin is scheduled to be published in the Winter of 2022, for which the editorial team invites contributions from members.

Original articles on any aspect of hydrology (e.g., administrative, technical, socioeconomic) will be considered for publication. It is not required that the article be based on academic or scientific work; however, it should not be published elsewhere. Book reviews may also be submitted under this category.

  • Please provide an unformatted word document of your story without embedded images. You can signify where you’d like a submitted image using brackets.
  • Images you wish to be included with your article must not be embedded in the Word document; send them separately and labeled with names corresponding to where you’d like them used in the Word document.
  • Articles must have a brief title and a byline.
  • Authors must have the full name, title and agency or association. 
  • Supply a high-resolution head-shot of the author.
  • Article length must be between 500 – 1000 words.
  • Please include an “About the Author” post script, to provide our audience with the context of your perspectives. Include how you would like your name and title to be presented.
  • Avoid using too many bulleted lists, diagrams or graphs in your article.

Beside original articles, members may also submit leads to items of interest to the hydrologists’ community. Such items may include news related to the field of hydrology, conferences, new publications, etc.

If you are interested in contributing, please send articles or other items of interest via the Dropbox link below by October 25, 2022. Please ensure submissions are identified properly (example: TitleofArticle-FirstLastName.doc) and that supporting graphics/images are of the highest possible quality and attached, not embedded in the word document. Be sure to include your contact information within your submission as well.

Submit An Article Today

Should you have any questions, do not hesitate to contact our office at admin@aihydrology.org.

President’s Message

AIHPresident Jamil IbrahimThis is an overdue update to our AIH members and community about what your AIH leadership team has been up to this year. I am thrilled to announce completion of critical and timely updates to the governing documents for our organization – our AIH Articles of Incorporation (formerly, Constitution) and AIH Bylaws. We initiated the review and update process in 2016. Over the past six years, past and current AIH leadership team members devoted many, many hours to completing a comprehensive review and developing suggested revisions to these documents. This review and update provided a great opportunity to reflect on how we have operated and how we will function in the future. In the spirit of these changes, Leonardo Da Vinci once remarked (translated to English): “When you put your hand in a flowing stream, you touch the last that has gone before and the first of what is still to come.” It is extremely gratifying to see the results of our review/update process in our new governing documents, and I look forward to the next steps.

There are many other great updates to share:

·        Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) Committee – Our DEI Committee developed and prioritized a list of initiatives and solicited feedback/input on implementation through a virtual meeting held in March of 2022. Please reach out to Julé Rizzardo (President-Elect) to join the DEI Committee and learn about these great initiatives.

·        Annual Meeting – Our leadership team held our (delayed) Annual Meeting virtually during March 2022. The meeting was supposed to be held during December 2021, to set our trajectory for 2022, but was delayed due to COVD concerns. In addition to specific tactics associated with strategies and goals that were identified by the Executive Director and members of our Board of Directors, we established three “working groups” to address: (1) Technical Journal/Conference Collaboration; (2) promotions, swag, and marketing; and (3) coordination with affiliate organizations. Contact myself or our management office to learn more and get involved. We are scheduled to get back on track and hold our Annual Meeting in December of 2022 (hopefully, in-person) and set plans for 2023.

·        AIH Webinars – Continued our AIH webinars with great presentations by AIH members Richard Koehler (PhD, PH) and Andrew Cohen( PhD, PH).

·        Engagement with Affiliate Organizations – Continued our engagement with other organizations through promoting PH certification for hydrologists and HT certification for hydrologic technicians at the 2022 World Environmental & Water Resources Congress (EWRI); Frontiers in Hydrology Meeting co-sponsored by the American Geophysical Union (AGU) and CUAHSI (Consortium of Universities for the Advancement of Hydrologic Science, Inc.); and 11th International Symposium on Managed Aquifer Recharge (ISMAR).

·        AIH 2022 Awards – We Issued our distinguished AIH awards to our 2022 award winners: Bruce Wilson, PhD (Ray K. Linsley Award for Surface Water); Todd Halihan, PhD (Charles V. Theis Award for Groundwater); and Vijay P. Singh, PhD, PH (Robert G. Wetzel Award for Water Quality). Note, we will present these awards to our award winners this year at the American Water Resources Association (AWRA) 2022 Annual Conference during their Awards Luncheon on November 9, 2022, in Seattle, Washington.

·        Examination Questions Database Update – We have a plan in place and are about to embark on a comprehensive update to our database of examination questions for our AIH certification exams. Updates will be completed prior to our next round of examinations, scheduled for November 2022.

As I’ve stated in each of my messages previously, member participation is vital to AIH’s success. We are eager to engage more members in AIH activities. Please reach out to our Secretary/Membership Liaison, Jolyne Lea, at membership@aihydrology.org, to get involved.

Sincerely,

Jamil S. Ibrahim PH, PMP, ENV SP
AIH President, 2021-2022

AIH Webinar – A Novel Approach To Quantify Streamflow Properties

A Novel Approach To Quantify Streamflow Properties

DESCRIPTION

Presented is a novel approach using autocorrelation lag (k) plots and sequence summations to quantify the streamflow properties of magnitude, frequency, duration, timing and rate of change. The resulting products are a combination of visualizations and tables providing streamflow information across all flow levels and address a fundamental hydrologic property – the temporal configuration of streamflow. Multiple regional case studies are presented to show the utility of this technique in different riverine environments.

Webinar learning objectives

  • Identify the additional information available in autocorrelation lag (k) plots.
  • Recognize the advantages of a temporal-based approach.
  • Describe ecohydrology effects based on information presented.

Introduction to the GroundwaterU Video Public Library | July 13 Webinar

AWRA and AIH | Introduction to the GroundwaterU Video Public Library – a new and free educational resource.
Please join us for a special AIH webinar on  July 13, 2022 | 1:00 – 2:00 PM ET

DESCRIPTION
The GroundwaterU Video Library is a free, online catalogue of high-quality educational videos for all things groundwater – from science and engineering to law and policy, in multiple languages and from around the world. An educational platform that serves to make groundwater knowledge accessible globally by way of high-quality and engaging educational videos. This presentation will describe the goals and value of the GroundwaterU education initiative, how to use the website, and how volunteers can share their own expertise with a global audience via customized videos at no cost.

LEARNING OBJECTIVES
Advocate the use of the GroundwaterU Video Library to help facilitate the spreading of groundwater knowledge. Give attendees the knowledge about the need for global groundwater education. Prepare attendees with the necessary directions for using the online library.
WEBINAR RECORDING & PDH CERTIFICATE
Included with your webinar registration is access to a recording of the program and a fillable certificate to self-report your Professional Development Hour (PDH)/Continuing Education Credit (CEU). Your certificate will be available to download and a link to the recording of this webinar will be sent within a week of the live program from membership@awra.org. The recording is exclusively for you, the registrant of the webinar. They are not to be shared or forwarded.

Promo codes AIH members (and non-members) should use to register for the webinar are as follows:
AIHM22 – AIH Members to pay $0.00
AIHNON22 – AIH nonmembers to pay $25.00 (used for tracking purposes only as this is the same price as AWRA nonmembers)

Register Today

About The Speaker: Andrew Cohen is a hydrogeologist located in New Jersey, USA. He received a Ph.D. from the University of California at Berkeley. His focus is hydrogeologic investigations, contaminant fate and transport, conceptual site models, and groundwater education. Prior to his current roles in the environmental consulting industry and Adjunct Professor of Contaminant Hydrogeology at the New Jersey Institute of Technology, he was a Research Associate at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, where he focused on hydrogeologic characterization and modeling of groundwater in fractured and faulted bedrock. He is now focused on the development of a free, online library of groundwater educational videos called the GroundwaterU Video Library, which he founded in January of this year.

NIBS – Scientific Resolution Panel Applicants

Hydrologists and Hydrologic Technicians:

The National Institute of Building Sciences (NIBS) is seeking scientific and technical experts to help review and resolve flood map challenges.

To serve on the Scientific Resolution Panel you must:

  •  Have a minimum of 10 years of proven experience with expertise in one of the following:
    • surface water hydrology
    • hydraulics
    • coastal engineering
    • other relevant engineering and scientific fields or a related field:
      • Coastal storm and hydraulic engineering
      • Coastal geotechnical engineering
      • Water resource engineering (surface water hydrology, open-channel flow hydraulics, hydrologic engineering)
      • Geotechnical engineering
      • Alluvial fan engineering
      • Levee analysis and mapping
      • FEMA guidelines and standards for flood risk analysis and mapping
  • They also must have expertise with riverine, lacustrine, coastal flood hazard, surveying, topographic information, hydrologic analysis, hydraulic analysis, coastal analysis or other pertinent experience applicable to the development of flood elevations and Flood Insurance Rate Maps (FIRMs).

To become a member of the panel or learn more about the scientific panel resolution initiative, or fill out an application: visit www.floodsrp.org/apply.

What Happens Next:

If approved, SRP Cadre members may be called to serve on one to three SRPs per year, averaging the equivalent of two to five days’ effort spread over three months.

Panels will be conducted virtually, with no travel involved. Panel members will be compensated for their services under contract with NIBS.

If you know anyone within your network who is also an expert and would be interested in participating, feel free to forward this information to them.

AIH Call For Articles – Deadline Extended!

The next issue of the AIH Bulletin is scheduled to be published in the Summer of 2022, for which the editorial team invites contributions from members.

Original articles on any aspect of hydrology (e.g., administrative, technical, socioeconomic) will be considered for publication. It is not required that the article be based on academic or scientific work; however, it should not be published elsewhere. Book reviews may also be submitted under this category.

  • Please provide an unformatted word document of your story without embedded images. You can signify where you’d like a submitted image using brackets.
  • Images you wish to be included with your article must not be embedded in the Word document; send them separately and labeled with names corresponding to where you’d like them used in the Word document.
  • Articles must have a brief title and a byline.
  • Authors must have the full name, title and agency or association. 
  • Supply a high-resolution head-shot of the author.
  • Article length must be between 500 – 1000 words.
  • Please include an “About the Author” post script, to provide our audience with the context of your perspectives. Include how you would like your name and title to be presented.
  • Avoid using too many bulleted lists, diagrams or graphs in your article.

Beside original articles, members may also submit leads to items of interest to the hydrologists’ community. Such items may include news related to the field of hydrology, conferences, new publications, etc.

If you are interested in contributing, please send articles or other items of interest via the Dropbox link below by May 27, 2022. Please ensure submissions are identified properly (example: TitleofArticle-FirstLastName.doc) and that supporting graphics/images are of the highest possible quality and attached, not embedded in the word document. Be sure to include your contact information within your submission as well.

Submit Your Article Today

Should you have any questions, do not hesitate to contact our office at admin@aihydrology.org.

EXTENDED – The American Institute of Hydrology (AIH) is issuing this Request for Proposals (RFP)

Update: We’ve extended the deadline from April 12 to April 19th! 

The American Institute of Hydrology (AIH) is issuing this Request for Proposals (RFP) to invite entities with specialized hydrology experience in hydrology and qualifications related to development of and training to support hydrology-related examination preparation. Responses are due April 19, 2022.

AIH intends to enter a multi-year contract with a single entity to provide certification exam support services. Note that the single contracted entity may enter into agreements with other entities or individuals to propose on services in responses to the RFP and for performance of services.

The American Institute of Hydrology (AIH) was founded in 1981 as a non-profit scientific and educational organization dedicated to the certification and registration of professionals in all fields of hydrology. AIH is the only nationwide organization that offers certification to qualified hydrologic professionals. AIH’s goal is to promote hydrology as a science and profession and to help protect public interest from non-professional practices.

View the Revised RFP

AIH – The Recertification Process

AIH – The Recertification Process

American Institute of Hydrology certified members provide expert knowledge, specialized skills, and adhere to the highest standards and ethics in the field of hydrology. Recertification of  members assures that they have continued to keep updated with current research, standards and practices. This ongoing educational requirement helps protect public interests and the profession from non-professional, sub-standard or unethical practices in a field involving complex water issues. Because of the continually changing nature of the field of hydrology and societal challenges, certified members need to continue their professional development throughout their careers and keep current in their specialty fields by engaging in professional practice, participating in continuing education courses, keeping up with technical literature, and attending professional meetings and seminars. Professional Development Hour (PDH), or Professional Development Credit (PDC), is defined as one contact hour of instruction, presentation, or study towards the goal of staying current in the field of practice. Specific competency requirements are determined by the Executive Committee on a periodic basis.

 

Certified members are responsible for keeping records of the number of PDH/PDC they earn along with associated documentation that can be validated by AIH. Documentation is due by January 15 of every 5 years, computed from the anniversary year of the individual member, in order to remain in compliance with certification. A minimum of 60 PDH/PDCs is required over 5 years to be eligible for recertification.

 

https://www.aihydrology.org/continuing-education-guidance/

Dates & Deadlines

Certemy has a notification system implemented for those in the recertification phase which notifies those who are approaching their application deadline 3 months ahead of time and again one month ahead. Given the recertification process spans over a 5-year period and requires professionals to provide proof of continuing education over this period of time, we understand that the notification process we currently have in place may not have been an appropriate amount of time to obtain the prerequisites for recertification – specifically the professional development credits component. As a result of this, we have restructured our notification process so that, moving forward, our members will receive notifications beginning 6 months ahead of time rather than 3 months. This will then be followed up by a 3-month notification with an additional final notification 1 month ahead of application due dates. 

AIH is revising the recertification process to make it easier for members to upload their recertification data. Implementation of this process is underway but not yet completed. This will be completed within the next 90 days. With that said, the Executive Committee recently voted on extending the recertification deadline an additional 6 months for any of our AIH professionals that are currently in the recertification phase. It is our hope that this will allow time to obtain the proper material needed to recertify. 

Certified members whose recertification is due in 2022 now have until July 15, 2022 to complete the process. 

 

Membership Dues

Annual membership dues are required every year, regardless of if you are in a recertification phase or not, in order to continue practicing under your earned credential.

 

Recertification Fees

Every 5 years, certified members must provide proof of eligibility to recertify, along with recertification fees. These fees are separate from your annual membership dues. 

The points above regarding dates & deadlines, membership dues, and recertification fees are what we hope is captured as a main takeaway from our members reading this message. We greatly value each of our members and we thank you for your continued support of AIH!

Awards Nominations

The American Institute of Hydrology (AIH) recognizes individuals for outstanding accomplishments in the fields of groundwater, surface water, water quality, and institute development. These awards are named after prominent scientists and engineers, who have made numerous lasting contributions to the hydrologic sciences. AIH Awards include:

  • Charles V. Theis Award for Groundwater
  • Ray K. Linsley Award for Surface Water
  • Robert G. Wetzel Award for Water Quality
  • Founders Award for Institute Development
Nominees Do Not Need to Be a Member of AIH!

The nomination packet for each award should contain the following:

  1. A formal nomination letter by the nominator, outlining the education, career, and a record of performance detailing accomplishments and noteworthy impact achieved by the potential candidate.
  2. A current resume of the nominee.
  3. A minimum of two and maximum of four supporting letters with a limit of three pages each.

The supporting letter writers should state briefly how they know the nominee and describe why the nominee is deserving of the award. Please submit your nomination to admin@aihydrology.org by Friday, March 25, 2022. Award winners will be notified and the awards will be presented at an upcoming conference to be determined later in the year.

The Charles Vernon (C.V.) Theis Award was established in 1986, to recognize individuals who have made outstanding contributions in groundwater hydrology. Charles V. Theis graduated with a PhD from the University of Cincinnati in June 1929 and made numerous contributions to the field of groundwater science throughout his life.

The Ray K. Linsley Award was established in 1986, to recognize individuals who have made outstanding contributions in surface water hydrology. Dr. Linsley made numerous contributions to surface water hydrology and was the principal author of the textbook Applied Hydrology, published by McGraw-Hill in 1949. He directed the PhD dissertations of 35 students at Stanford University covering research on mechanics of overland flow, rainfall synthesis, stochastic hydrology, and modeling of the hydrologic cycle. These efforts led to the development of the Stanford Watershed Model, a state-of-the-art tool of hydrologists worldwide.

The Robert G. Wetzel Award recognizes individuals who have made outstanding contributions in the field of water quality. This award was dedicated in 2006, to the family of the late Robert G. Wetzel. Dr. Wetzel was a true leader in the field of freshwater science. His thoughts and brilliant synthesis of all aspects of lakes and streams are included in more than 30 books and 400+ publications including the definitive college textbook of this field, Limnology.

The AIH Founders Award was established in 1990, to recognize individuals who have provided outstanding, long and dedicated service to the Institute. It was established to honor the AIH founders Sandor Csallany, Alex Zaporozec, and Roman Kanivetsky. The award is given at the discretion of the AIH Executive Board to a member in good standing.

President’s Message

AIHPresident Jamil Ibrahim

Greetings! The end of the calendar year is a common period for self-reflection by individuals and organizations. As I look back while concluding the first year of my two-year term as your American Institute of Hydrology (AIH) President, I’m delighted about the accomplishments of your AIH leadership team during 2021. Our achievements this year, however, are not just a function of what we did during 2021 – they consider the steps taken by AIH over the past few years to address challenges and introduce new perspectives, along with the great work of your leadership team.

We did great things in 2021! Thank you to all who contributed. Here’s a snapshot of our accomplishments:

  • Boosted AIH’s membership by 22% compared to 2020 and received 35% more new member applications during 2021 compared to the previous year.
  • Held the Institute’s first virtual meet-and-greet event with AIH members.
  • Connected our AIH community through in-person Water New Year celebrations in Minneapolis, Minnesota and Sacramento, California. One of the three co-founders of AIH, Roman Kanivetsky, joined in the Minneapolis event!
  • Welcomed our first Hydrologic Technician (HT) to serve as a member of AIH’s leadership team on our Executive Committee (EC).
  • Completed a widely popular and informative webinar series on the topic of Forecast Informed Reservoir Operations (FIRO). Our FIRO series, provided in collaboration with the American Water Resources Association (AWRA), featured our nation’s top experts on FIRO, an innovative strategy for water resources management that leverages use of advanced hydrological and meteorological data.
  • Convened a new Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) Task Force composed of AIH members and members from the EC. Stay tuned – you will have an opportunity to learn more and support the important activities our DEI Task Force will be initiating within the next few months.
  • Revamped our membership application and database system. Despite the glitches our administration team encountered after the rollout, we’re confident our modernization changes will improve ease of application development by prospective members, application review and processing by our Board of Registration, and provide enhanced member benefits through access of information and content.
  • Presented to audiences at professional conferences about AIH and the importance of Professional Hydrologist (PH) certification for hydrologists and HT certification for hydrologic technicians, including: Groundwater Resources Association of California’s (GRAC) Future of Water Conference; Consortium of Universities for the Advancement of Hydrologic Science’s (CUAHSI) Biennial Colloquium; AWRA’s 2021 Annual conference; and the University of Minnesota’s 2021 Minnesota Water Resources Conference.
  • Improved social media presence and member connectivity.
  • Coordinated with researchers for the U.S. Department of Labor on development of information on hydrologist and hydrologic technician occupations.

Also, we are nearly complete with revisions and updates to AIH’s Bylaws and a contracting solicitation for AIH examination support services–both scheduled for distribution early in 2022.

Again – Thank you to all who have stepped forward to take on roles to help advance the mission of AIH. Member participation is vital to AIH’s success and we are eager to engage more members in AIH activities. Even if not interested in taking on a leadership role for AIH or getting involved in various subcommittees or groups, we request all our members to be ambassadors for AIH and its certified members. Please contact me or others on our leadership team to learn more about how to get involved.

Sincerely,

Jamil S. Ibrahim PH, PMP, ENV SP

AIH President, 2021-2022