As an undergraduate in Civil Engineering at Virginia Tech, Lisa Decker was active as a member of the student chapter of the American Society of Civil Engineers through the Concrete Canoe Design Team. As a co-op student, she worked in the Jefferson National Forest with the U.S. Forest Service in Roanoke. She also served as a Newman Community volunteer, tutoring in math at Blacksburg High School and visiting with the children at the Christiansburg Juvenile Detention Home.



After receiving her B.S. in 1994, Ms. Decker entered CEE's graduate program, working as a graduate research assistant and completing a thesis, "Controlling the Cost of Workers' Compensation in Construction." She completed her M.S., with an emphasis in Construction Engineering and Management, in 1995 and accepted a position as Project Engineer with the Whiting-Turner Contracting Company in Baltimore, Maryland.



Her early projects with Whiting-Turner included multi-million-dollar renovations at two hospitals and a $4.1 million renovation and new addition to a Baltimore historic site, the House of Ruth.



In 1998 Ms. Decker was promoted to Project Manager and directed construction of a new ambulatory surgery center for the Specialty Care Network in Baltimore. Whiting-Turner demonstrated its confidence in the young manager's abilities by putting her in charge of major renovations and additions to the St. Joseph Medical Center. This work, completed in 1999, involved five separate projects, including the addition of a medical/surgical intensive care unit, with a total budget of $12.2 million.



Currently, Ms. Decker is managing a $10 million project at Johns Hopkins University. She is directing construction of the university's Homewood Campus Recreation Center, a 62,000-square-foot athletic facility.



Ms. Decker is chair of the Interns/Associates Program of the American Institute of Architects (AIA) Baltimore Professional Affiliates Committee. She directs seminars on "how to be contractors"-which include simulated bid days-that the committee offers to architect interns. In 1999, she received the Distinguished Service Award from the AIA for her work with the seminars and for creating seminar lesson plans.



She also is active in the Baltimore chapter of the Junior League, an international service organization for young women. Ms. Decker helps conduct the League's "Welfare to Work" seminars for the House of Ruth and the Women's Housing Coalition. The goal of the seminars is to help women who are homeless or the victims of domestic violence get off of Welfare and back to work.



A Baltimore-area native, Lisa lives in Towson, Maryland. As an active Virginia Tech recruiter for Whiting-Turner, she returns to her alma mater regularly to meet with engineering students.