2024 Midwest Regional Conference Recap

The 2024 NAYGN Midwest Regional Conference was held at the Sargent & Lundy Offices in Chicago, IL on December 3rd and 4th, 2024. The conference included 2 days of jam-packed activities including networking, guest speakers, and a tour of Argonne National Laboratory.

For the first session of the day, speaker Meridith Anderson, PMP, JD spoke on how to work with difficult people. Using examples from her career in construction, both inside and outside of the nuclear industry, she provided practical strategies for managing challenging interactions in the workplace.

Following Meridith, Jared Birkmann, the NAYGN Midwest Lead gave a very interesting presentation on the history of nuclear power and the energizing past of NAYGN. He traced the development of nuclear energy from early days to the present and provided insight into the importance of nuclear development for North America and the world.

Next, Sargent and Lundy's Steven Alonso moderated a fantastic panel on Digital Modernization and Innovative Applications of Nuclear Energy, featuring S&L's Vice President and Director of Digital I&C Consulting Pereez Golub and Senior Vice President Alan Wilson. Their experience in working on S&L's up and coming projects provided an engaging session for NAYGN members to look to the future.

After lunch, Constellation's (and past NAYGN Core member) Tae Wook presented on the Front End of the Fuel Cycle, which was one of the highest rated sessions of the day. The conference attendees followed along as he traced the fuel cycle from mining uranium ore, through manufacturing, transport, and eventual use in nuclear applications.

NAYGN's Communications Chair Paula Rusenovich gave a presentation on the 2024 Career report, highlighting top reasons that people join, stay in, and leave the nuclear industry, and providing insights about the most important areas for companies to focus on to increase retention of qualified individuals.

The conference's events wrapped up with a presentation from Xcel Energy's Jeremy Davis on the subjective nature of success, helping participants to understand their own path to success through personal examples. He highlighted the importance of setting goals and understanding one's own values and motivations. Jeremy encouraged participants to reflect on their own definitions of success and to consider what truly matters to them in their professional and personal lives.

The day ended with a networking event at Chicago's Industry Ales, giving conference participants time to talk about the day's events and some time to interact with leaders from Sargent and Lundy.

On the second day of the conference, NAYGN members went on a private tour of the Argonne National Laboratory in Lemont, IL. Special stops on the tour included Argonne's supercomputer, particle accelerator, and the nuclear sciences building where participants saw (and touched!) artefacts from the first self-sustained, human-made nuclear reactor, Chicago Pile 1.