Continuing Education Sessions
Learn more about our informative sessions and insightful speakers.
Earn Continuing Education Hours
By participating in this year’s annual conference, registrants can earn up to 42 Continuing Education (CE) Hours:
- Thursday opening Keynote presentation (1.5 CE Hours)
- Friday morning Keynote presentation (1.5 CE Hours)
- Friday afternoon Keynote presentation and closing remarks (1.5 CE Hours)
- CE sessions (up to 32 CE Hours available)
- Pre-conference workshop (3 CE Hours)
- AGM (3 CE Hours)
Please note that you must self-report your conference CE Hours based on the sessions that you attended in full.
Learning Streams
Browse this year's selection of learning offerings. More sessions to be announced soon!
Technical
Building Agentic AI: Frameworks, Runtimes, Memory, and Guardrails for Trustworthy Autonomous Systems
Presenter: Kinman Lam, P.Eng.
AI is evolving from static models to autonomous agents that reason,plan, and act. This creates new engineering challenges around execution, persistence, and safety. This presentation covers the four essential components of production agentic AI systems, drawn from real-world Canadian implementations. We will cover agentic frameworks and orchestration patterns; runtimes environments; short-term and long-term memory architectures including retrieval-augmented generation; and guardrails encompassing validation, boundary enforcement, and human-in-the-loop controls. Attendees will leave with a reference architecture, a pattern selection framework, and practical safety guidance connecting autonomous AI design to the engineer's professional duty of care.
Building Coastal Resilience Through Indigenous Leadership, Nature-Based Solutions, and Community Stewardship
Presenter: Jessica Wilson, P.Eng.
The Tsleil-Waututh Nation (səlilwətaɬ) Reserve Shoreline Adaptation and Restoration Project showcases how Indigenous leadership, community engagement, and nature-based solutions can be combined to create lasting coastal resilience. Located along Burrard Inlet in North Vancouver, the project addresses shoreline erosion, habitat loss, and risks to culturally significant sites through a comprehensive eco-cultural restoration approach.
Developed through more than 30 community engagement sessions and informed by both Indigenous knowledge and scientific investigations, the project integrated field studies, vessel wake monitoring, numerical modelling, and physical modelling to guide design development. The resulting shoreline design includes beach nourishment, terraced rock headlands, a habitat island, salt marsh restoration, and culturally significant native vegetation, creating a resilient shoreline that supports biodiversity, cultural use, and long-term stewardship.
With construction completed in 2026 and stewardship monitoring underway, the project provides a leading example of how nature-based coastal adaptation can be implemented in a constrained urban-industrial setting while advancing Indigenous priorities and cultural renewal. This presentation will share lessons learned and practical approaches for co-developing, designing, and implementing complex coastal climate adaptation projects with Indigenous communities.
CCS in Canada – Are We Making Progress?
Presenter: Dr. Brad Hayes, P.Geo.
Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS) is recognized by the International Energy Agency as an important mechanism to reduce net anthropogenic carbon dioxide emissions. Canada's professional geoscientists and engineers make our nation a global CCS leader. Several storage projects are active in the Western Canada Sedimentary Basin, and numerous research projects are underway across the nation to assess new capacity, improve carbon capture technology and optimize CO2 transportation. Today we'll look at both Canadian and global storage projects and supporting research to determine how well we are progressing toward achieving meaningful reduction of CO2 emissions.
Designing for Climate Change Effects Through NBC 2025 Loading Provisions
Presenter: Andy Metten, P.Eng., Struct.Eng., FEC
Extreme weather events are no longer rare—they're a daily signal that our climate is changing. Rising atmospheric carbon levels have accelerated global warming, leading to shifts in the very weather patterns that inform how we design buildings. These shifts have brought increased wind speeds, heavier snowfalls, and more intense thermal loads, all of which pose new challenges for structural integrity.
Across Canada, large snowstorms have already caused structural failures, exposing vulnerabilities in buildings designed to outdated codes that didn’t account for these evolving conditions. As structural engineers, we recognize that environmental loads are changing—but integrating these new realities into our design practices remains a complex challenge. The buildings we design today must be resilient enough to withstand the impacts of climate change for the next 75 to 100 years.
This presentation will explore how wind and snow loading requirements have evolved in Canada since the earliest building codes. It will also highlight how these loads—and the procedures used to calculate them have changed through the provisions of the recently released NBC 2025. Case studies of the snow load design of a roof beam in Vancouver, Whistler and Kelowna will be shown.
Envision in Practice – BCIT's Guichon Creek Sink Hole Urgent Response Project
Presenter: Marco Cusano, P.Eng.
This session introduces the Envision Sustainable Infrastructure Framework and its application in engineering practice. Participants will gain a high-level understanding of how Envision supports infrastructure owners and project teams when integrating sustainability and resilience into project delivery. The session will then examine the BCIT Guichon Creek Sinkhole Urgent Response Project as a case study, where the team responded to critical asset failure under significant constraints and advanced a naturalized creek daylighting solution. Key topics include risk-based planning, permitting, and construction sequencing, with a focus on practical learnings from applying Envision.
From Knowing to Doing: Reimagining Engineering Through Indigenous Ways of Knowing
Presenters: Janis Brooks
Many engineers have been introduced to Indigenous knowledge. Far fewer have had the opportunity to explore why that knowledge so often fails to influence the way projects are planned, designed, and delivered.
This session moves beyond awareness to examine the gap between knowing and doing. Together, we'll explore how engineering has been shaped by colonial systems, why technical knowledge alone isn't enough to build respectful relationships with Indigenous Peoples, and what it means to approach Indigenous Knowledge as something to build relationships with rather than something to acquire.
Through stories, practical examples, and guided reflection, participants will leave with a new perspective on ethical engineering practice and a clearer understanding of where meaningful change begins.
From Standards to Stream: A Blueprint for Municipal Green Infrastructure
Presenters: Nick Mead-Fox, P.Eng. & Osvaldo Vega, P.Eng.
Successful Green Rainwater Infrastructure (GRI) requires bridging the gap between high-level goals and ground-level constraints. The presentation will begin with technical standards we developed to ensure municipal scalability, affordability, and efficacy. Using case studies of different scales, we will illustrate how we navigate constraints and coordinate with stakeholders to support implementation in utility-heavy public rights-of-way and sensitive park spaces. These case studies will also be used to demonstrate the positive value proposition of GRI at different scales. We will conclude by sharing the watershed-scale impacts of distributed GRI systems on citywide water management, urban habitat protection, and receiving waterbodies.
Highlights of Recent Research on the Geology and Metallogeny of the Golden Triangle
Presenter: Roddy Campbell, P.Geo.
Overview of recent work by the BC Geological Survey (BCGS) in the Golden Triangle. The Golden Triangle is an area of significant mineral endowment in northwestern BC. Over the last 10+ years, the BCGS have been conducting work to better understand the processes that led to this mineral wealth. This work has included bedrock mapping, the development of stratigraphic and plutonic frameworks, and the support of critical mineral studies.
Highway 93/95 Animal Overpass - A Case Study
Presenters: Lindsey Li, P.Eng., Stuart Murphy, P.Eng., & Duane Wells
This presentation highlights the Wildlife Overpass in Radium Hot Springs, developed to improve roadway safety and protect the region’s iconic bighorn sheep. The case study explores key considerations in planning and delivering wildlife crossing infrastructure, including site selection, crossing characteristics based on target species, funding considerations, and project payback. The presentation also reviews the design of buried bridge structures used to create the overpass, site-specific engineering challenges, and construction delivery. A one-year project overview will share early observations on wildlife use and public awareness, demonstrating the ecological and economic benefits of maintaining safe connectivity for migrating wildlife across transportation corridors.
Navigating Assurance for Complex Systems: A Guide to Safety Argumentation for Complex Systems
Presenters: Simon Diemert, P.Eng. & Dr. Jeff Joyce, P.Eng.
Every engineering project has a safety story, but often that story is scattered across disconnected documents, implicit assumptions, and the institutional memory of key individuals. As projects grow, the result is a safety rationale that is difficult to understand and might contain gaps that no single contributor can fully see. Assurance arguments offer a structured way to organize and communicate the safety story. This method is widely used to assure software-intensive systems in the defense, energy, automotive, and rail sectors. Notations like the Goal Structuring Notation (GSN) provide explicit, traceable links between top-level safety claims and the evidence that underpins them. The assurance case method makes safety arguments explicit and open to scrutiny by engineering experts. Preparing an assurance case is a recommendation in Engineers and Geoscientists BC's professional practice guidelines for the development of safety- and security-critical software, though the assurance case method is applicable to many engineering and geoscience applications. This presentation introduces the core concepts of assurance argumentation and demonstrates how they apply to the complex, multi-disciplinary projects that BC's engineers and geoscientists routinely face. The session will also address practical concerns: how to get started, how assurance arguments interact with existing standards and regulations, and where the approach delivers the most value.
Physical and Cyber-Resilience Assessment for Critical Infrastructure
Presenters: Dr. Moein Manbachi, P.Eng. & Minoo Shariat-Zadeh, P.Eng.
As critical infrastructure systems become increasingly digitalized, interconnected, and decentralized, particularly within modern energy systems, assessing resilience has become as important as ensuring reliability. Beyond maintaining normal operations, infrastructure must be capable of anticipating, withstanding, adapting to, and rapidly recovering from both physical, cyber-physical, and other disruptions. This session presents emerging methodologies and practical approaches for physical and cyber-resilience assessment of critical infrastructure. Topics include multi-layer modeling of assets, communication networks, and cyber systems; resilience metric development; disturbance and threat scenario design; impact propagation and consequence analysis; and AI-enabled evaluation of response and recovery strategies. The session will also showcase a digital twin-driven resilience assessment framework through a real-world case study, demonstrating how advanced modeling and simulation can support more informed planning, risk management, and operational decision-making.
Policy to Practice: Structural Engineers and Embodied Carbon
Presenters: Forest Borch, P.Eng., Stephanie Dalo, P.Eng., Harshan Radhakrishnan, P.Eng., Rory Roberts, P.Eng.
What are the professional obligations and responsibilities of structural engineers in addressing current and emerging embodied carbon policies, codes, and standards? This presentation examines changes in the embodied carbon regulatory and professional practice landscape, featuring work from the City of Vancouver, Engineers and Geoscientists BC, and leading structural design firms. The session clarifies the professional responsibilities and practice expectations of structural engineers of record in relation to embodied carbon, including calculation, reporting, design decision-making, and coordination through project delivery. Real‑world examples demonstrate efficient structural designs that reduce both cost and carbon, and the structural engineer’s role in achieving these outcomes.
Polar Icebreaker: From Concept to Delivery
Presenters: Jessica Fetterman, P.Eng., Chris Hall, P.Eng., Matthew Hayne, P.Eng., & Benhur Pereira, P.Eng.
The presentation provides an engineering overview of the design, construction, and delivery of Canada’s largest polar icebreaker. Intended for practicing engineers, it explains the multidisciplinary scope required to transform mission requirements into a fully operational vessel. Topics covered include the regulatory framework, naval architecture, structural and mechanical systems, propulsion, electronics, and shipyard production engineering. The session will show the design phases, manufacturing challenges, welding and forming constraints, block assembly, launch method, and sea trials. Attendees will gain insight into marine project integration, regulatory compliance, and the coordination required to deliver a complex Arctic vessel from concept through final delivery.
Ethical
Designing for a Changing Climate: Integrating Risk, Resilience, and Professional Responsibility into Engineering Practice
Presenters: Parvin Asadi, P.Eng.
Climate change is no longer a future consideration, it is a current design parameter. Engineers are increasingly expected to account for evolving climate risks while upholding their professional responsibility to protect the public and the environment. This session explores how climate projections can be integrated into engineering workflows to improve resilience, reduce performance gaps, and support defensible decision-making. Participants will gain practical tools for climate risk screening, documentation, and stakeholder communication, enabling them to incorporate resilience into projects while aligning with ethical and regulatory obligations.
Engineering Inclusive Cultures That Last: Policies, Practices, Leadership
Presenters: Ashley Kairu, EIT & Stacy Kairu
Engineering organizations are asking the right questions about diversity, but not always about belonging and inclusion. Drawing on research and workplace examples, the presentation will examine how team dynamics, leadership behaviours, and organizational systems influence belonging in technical environments. Participants will gain practical strategies to design cultures that improve retention, strengthen collaboration, and enhance performance. Led by co-founders of BIPOC Women’s Society, a professional community supporting women of colour, this session bridges lived experience with industry insight. This session delivers actionable strategies engineers and geoscientists can use to build workplaces where diverse talent is retained, grows, and advances into leadership.
Engineers and Geoscientists BC’s Truth and Reconciliation Strategy: Listening, Learning, and Leadership
Presenters: Sneha Satheendran & Ailene Lim
What does it take to turn a commitment to reconciliation into meaningful action? This session will explore the development of an organizational Truth and Reconciliation strategy, including an environmental scan and consultation process that engaged more than 30 groups including Indigenous communities, government, industry, registrants, firms, academia, and other professional regulators. Attendees will gain insight into the collaborative approach used to shape the strategy and the key lessons learned throughout the process.
The session will highlight the resulting strategic goals focused on supporting individual registrants and firms, strengthening regulatory processes, fostering organizational culture, and advancing leadership and influence, guided by Indigenous principles. Practical insights into the strategy development process, potential implications for registrants and firms, and ideas for advancing reconciliation across the professions will also be shared.
Ethics Beyond the Rulebook: Applying Professional Values in Grey Areas
Presenters: Ian Sivanandan, P.Eng., Monica Feregrino, P.Eng.
Not all ethical challenges are addressed by rules or checklists. This panel-style session will bring together presenters from diverse areas of practice to discuss ethical reasoning in grey areas, including situations involving time pressure, incomplete information, competing values, environmental circumstances, or safety-critical decisions. The session will explore how engineers and geoscientists can use professional principles to make sound decisions, act with confidence, and justify their professional judgment when clear answers are not available.
Speaking Up Is Part of the Job: Psychological Safety and Professional Accountability
Presenter: Apsara Telwatte
Psychological safety is often discussed as a driver of teamwork, trust, and innovation. In professional practice, it also plays another critical role: helping people raise concerns, challenge assumptions, admit uncertainty, and surface risk before issues escalate. This session will explore psychological safety through the lens of accountability, with a focus on the everyday moments when speaking up matters most. Participants will consider why people hesitate to raise concerns, how accountability and psychological safety reinforce each other, and what individuals, teams, and leaders can do to make respectful challenge a normal part of the job. Through practical examples and reflection, attendees will leave with simple language and tools they can use to support earlier, clearer, and more constructive conversations in their own workplaces.
Top Discipline Cases
Presenter: Cheryl Cuddie & Jake Schroeder
Two speakers from the legal department of Engineers and Geoscientists BC will discuss the important discipline and enforcement cases over the past year, and what lessons can be taken away from those cases. Cases will vary between technical and conduct matters and will assist registrants in considering actions they can take to avoid similar issues in their own practices. (The presenters will not be discussing ongoing investigations or active discipline cases.)
Voluntary Sustainability Program for Registrant Firms
Presenter: Virginie Brunetaud
Engineers and Geoscientists BC is developing a new Sustainability Program specifically for registrant firms interested in advancing their sustainability journey. The voluntary program will build on the existing Permit to Practice Program and is anticipated to be soft launched in Fall 2026. It will provide tools, training and guidance on various sustainability topics to help firms incorporate sustainability in their professional practice. This presentation will briefly describe how the program was developed. It will detail the benefits and potential outcomes for firms willing to participate in this program and the process of enrolling.
Regulatory
From Bylaw to Practice: Applying Engineers and Geoscientists BC's Risk Assessment Framework
Presenters: Amy Fehr, P.Eng. & Marg Latham, P.Eng.
The practice of professional engineering and professional geoscience carries inherent risk, and assessment of that risk has always been, and continues to be an integral part of practice. A recent change to Engineers and Geoscientists BC Bylaws clarifies risk assessment as a key quality management component that factors into other quality management decisions such as type of checking to undertake, number of field reviews to perform, and whether an independent review can be carried out within the firm that the work was initiated. In this presentation, Amy will outline the Bylaw requirements and briefly discuss the contents of the new Quality Management Guide – Guide to the Standard for Documented Risk Assessments. Marg will then walk through the risk assessment and mitigation process, using real life examples to add context for their application. Join us for a practical session to gain a better understanding of how to meet the risk assessment requirements within your practice.
Professional Judgment at a Distance: Practicing Responsibly in Hybrid and Remote Environments
Presenters: Harshan Radhakrishnan, P.Eng.
Hybrid and remote work have become a routine part of professional engineering and geoscience practice. While work locations and collaboration methods have evolved, Engineers and Geoscientists BC’s Bylaws and quality management requirements apply equally. This presentation highlights key risks, decision points, and documentation expectations unique to distributed teams, along with effective controls that support accountability and professional judgment. This session will support registrants and registrant firms in understanding how quality management expectations can be met and demonstrate compliance in hybrid and remote work environments.
Resilient Electrification: Field Insights, Code Evolution, and Incentives
Presenters: Jeremy Overton, Jason Rowley, Tsajar Demsar
Futureproofing the mechanical and electrical systems central to a low-carbon built environment depends on safety codes and regulations that enable innovation, accelerate adoption, and strengthen climate resilience. This session from Technical Safety BC and BC Hydro experts will explore practical examples of extreme weather impacts on electrical systems, and how evidence-based incident investigations and permit insights influence technical code evolution. Speakers will highlight how the 2027 edition of the Canadian Electrical Code advances resilience and supports emerging technologies, how these new technologies are further supported by enhanced rebate programs, concluding with actional strategies attendees can apply within their day-to-day practice.
Turning Compliance into Practice: Insights from Individual and Firm Audits
Presenter: Mira Nasser, Dr. Krupal Pal, P.Eng., Jodie Miller, P.Eng., Thiago Fernandes, P.Eng.
This session will share common observations and trends identified through compliance audits of Engineers and Geoscientists registrants (individuals and firms). It will highlight recurring findings across different industries and areas of practice including differences between registrants practicing inside and outside BC. Participants will gain insight into frequent compliance challenges; the session will also address recent Bylaw changes highlighting practical strategies registrants can implement to address common findings and succeed in their compliance practices.
Communications & Leadership
Communicating with Clarity and Speed
Presenter: Eric Tung
Learn how to communicate in a clear and concise manner. Apply the direct approach in your communications, whether presenting to leaders, colleagues, clients, or others. This session will focus on core communication strategies and techniques to ensure your content is clear and persuasive, whether you’re writing an executive brief or detailed email. In addition, you’ll learn how to best convey recommendations, anticipate objections and concerns, answer key questions, and use AI tools effectively.
Human Edge Leadership in the Age of AI
Presenter: Ralph Kison, Jeret Unger
Technical expertise opens the door to your career, but it is your human skills that will determine your leadership trajectory and positive impact on others. As AI reshapes the highly technical professions of engineering and geoscience, the leaders who focus on growing their emotional intelligence in self-awareness, strategic adaptability, cultural adeptness and human-centric communications will stand apart. This session explores why the future belongs to professionals who can engage people, build trust, navigate ambiguity, and lead with clarity. Attendees will gain practical insight into the human side of leadership success, including how to strengthen relational prowess, communicate with impact, and influence others effectively for both individual and organizational success.
Learning Outcomes: Participants will leave this engaging one-hour session with the following take-aways:
- Identify at least three human-centered leadership skills that will increasingly differentiate engineers and geoscientists in an AI-shaped professional environment.
- Uncover up to three personal communication or listening blind spots that may be limiting trust, influence, or team effectiveness.
- Discover three practical strategies to improve active listening, relational effectiveness, and communication clarity in workplace interactions.
- Create a next-step action commitment to strengthen one of their key leadership areas within the next 30 days, such as: establishing greater trust, improving communication, influence or impacting team effectiveness.
Manage Your Reaction Before It Manages You
Presenter: Monica Chang
When something at work sets off a strong reaction, whether it's tension with a colleague or a decision with real stakes, that reaction can take over before you've had a chance to think it through.
In this hands-on session, you'll learn a practical technique for staying calm under pressure so that you can think more clearly, and identify your next steps to making better decisions. We'll work through a real-life example together, then apply the technique to a tricky situation you bring with you.
You’ll leave with both personal insights and a framework that you can use the next time you find yourself in a challenging situation.
Neurodivergent Strategies for Work: Communication, Self-Support, and Sustainability
Presenter: Heather McCain
This session is designed for neurodivergent professionals working in environments that are not always built with their needs in mind. Together, we will explore practical ways to communicate your needs, manage daily work expectations, and move through common challenges such as overwhelm, unclear expectations, and difficulty getting started or finishing tasks.”
We will look at how workplace norms and unspoken expectations can create barriers, and how to respond to them in ways that are realistic and supportive. Participants will learn communication strategies for asking for what they need, setting boundaries, and navigating conversations with colleagues and supervisors.
Using real-life examples, this workshop will walk through situations many people face at work and offer strategies that can be adapted to fit your own strengths and working style. We will also explore tools for organizing tasks, managing time, and reducing stress when demands feel unclear or too high.
There will be space to reflect on how workplace experiences can affect confidence and mental health, including the impact of self-doubt and internalized pressure. Participants will be supported in identifying approaches that are more sustainable and aligned with how they work best.
Led by a neurodivergent facilitator, this session offers both practical tools and a supportive space to learn, reflect, and connect with others who may share similar experiences.
Stop Letting That Difficult Person Ruin Your Day
Presenter: Beverly Beuermann-King
Are you drained by difficult individuals in your workplace? Working with other people is never easy. Most people don’t struggle because they lack patience; they struggle because they don’t have a clear, practical way to respond. Using The 7 Reality Anchors™ gain clarity around core truths. Apply the 3P™ Assessment Model to real workplace situations. You'll know WHAT to focus on to move these interactions forward, HOW to respond, and WAYS to manage the impact. By mastering the art of handling difficult people, you’ll stop reacting and start responding with intention, you’ll improve communication and regain control of your day.
Strategic Networking: Make Your Contacts Count
Presenter: Joanna Shea
Engineering careers are built not only on technical expertise, but on trusted professional relationships. This presentation explores how engineers and geoscientists can network strategically to unlock opportunities, strengthen collaboration, and increase professional impact. Participants will learn to (1) distinguish transactional networking from strategic relationship building, (2) map their personal, professional, and strategic networks, (3) articulate a clear value proposition, (4) apply two techniques for making strong first impressions, and (5) use practical strategies to maintain and grow their network. The session focuses on how intentional networking can lead to career advancement, project opportunities, and stronger professional influence.
What No One Tells Engineers About Management
Presenter: Will Ferry, P.Eng.
What No One Tells Engineers About Management: Why Some High Performers Thrive as Leaders While Others Struggle. Technical excellence gets engineers promoted, but it doesn't prepare them for leadership. Success is no longer defined by solving complex problems, but by guiding people, thinking strategically, and building influence. For many engineers, this shift is harder than expected. In this session, Will Ferry shares practical tools and lessons from aerospace, robotics, electronics, and leadership development to help engineers make that transition with greater confidence. Attendees will leave with frameworks to create a compelling vision, build buy-in, and lead with clarity and impact.
Why Major Engineering Projects Become Major Project Management Disasters
Presenter: Dr. George Jergeas
Major engineering and construction projects are inherently uncertain and volatile. Their scale, complexity, and long duration make predictable outcomes extremely difficult to achieve. Decades of staggering cost overruns and schedule delays offer little confidence that the estimates presented to project executives—CEOs, Boards of Directors, Government Ministers, and City Councils—can be relied upon. This short presentation is designed for Engineers and Geoscientists BC members and professionals involved directly or indirectly in the planning, engineering, and construction of capital projects, as well as those serving as project executives, directors, and managers. The session will provide a concise analysis of current industry practices and highlight value improving approaches that can enhance the delivery and predictability of these highly complex projects. In particular, the speaker will outline practical ways to strengthen project decision making, risk and contingency management, governance, and assurance/oversight.
Learning Streams
Browse this year's selection of learning offerings. More sessions to be announced soon!
CCS in Canada – Are We Making Progress?
Presenter: Dr. Brad Hayes, P.Geo.
Coming soon
Envision in Practice – BCIT's Guichon Creek Sink Hole Urgent Response Project
Presenter: Marco Cusano, P.Eng.
Coming soon
Designing for Climate Change Effects Through NBC 2025 Loading Provisions
Presenter: Andy Metten, P.Eng., Struct.Eng., FEC
Coming soon
Building Agentic AI: Frameworks, Runtimes, Memory, and Guardrails for Trustworthy Autonomous Systems
Presenter: Kinman Lam, P.Eng.
Coming soon
Building Coastal Resilience Through Indigenous Leadership, Nature-Based Solutions, and Community Stewardship
Presenter: Jessica Wilson, P.Eng.
The Tsleil-Waututh Nation (səlilwətaɬ) Reserve Shoreline Adaptation and Restoration Project showcases how Indigenous leadership, community engagement, and nature-based solutions can be combined to create lasting coastal resilience. Located along Burrard Inlet in North Vancouver, the project addresses shoreline erosion, habitat loss, and risks to culturally significant sites through a comprehensive eco-cultural restoration approach.
Developed through more than 30 community engagement sessions and informed by both Indigenous knowledge and scientific investigations, the project integrated field studies, vessel wake monitoring, numerical modelling, and physical modelling to guide design development. The resulting shoreline design includes beach nourishment, terraced rock headlands, a habitat island, salt marsh restoration, and culturally significant native vegetation, creating a resilient shoreline that supports biodiversity, cultural use, and long-term stewardship.
With construction completed in 2026 and stewardship monitoring underway, the project provides a leading example of how nature-based coastal adaptation can be implemented in a constrained urban-industrial setting while advancing Indigenous priorities and cultural renewal. This presentation will share lessons learned and practical approaches for co-developing, designing, and implementing complex coastal climate adaptation projects with Indigenous communities.
From Knowing to Doing: Reimagining Engineering Through Indigenous Ways of Knowing
Presenters: Janis Brooks
Many engineers have been introduced to Indigenous knowledge. Far fewer have had the opportunity to explore why that knowledge so often fails to influence the way projects are planned, designed, and delivered.
This session moves beyond awareness to examine the gap between knowing and doing. Together, we'll explore how engineering has been shaped by colonial systems, why technical knowledge alone isn't enough to build respectful relationships with Indigenous Peoples, and what it means to approach Indigenous Knowledge as something to build relationships with rather than something to acquire.
Through stories, practical examples, and guided reflection, participants will leave with a new perspective on ethical engineering practice and a clearer understanding of where meaningful change begins.
From Standards to Stream: A Blueprint for Municipal Green Infrastructure
Presenters: Nick Mead-Fox, P.Eng. & Osvaldo Vega, P.Eng.
Coming soon
Highlights of Recent Research on the Geology and Metallogeny of the Golden Triangle
Presenter: Roddy Campbell, P.Geo.
Coming soon
Highway 93/95 Animal Overpass - A Case Study
Presenters: Lindsey Li, P.Eng., Stuart Murphy, P.Eng., & Duane Wells
Coming soon
Navigating Assurance for Complex Systems: A Guide to Safety Argumentation for Complex Systems
Presenters: Simon Diemert, P.Eng. & Dr. Jeff Joyce, P.Eng.
Coming soon
Physical and Cyber-Resilience Assessment for Critical Infrastructure
Presenters: Dr. Moein Manbachi, P.Eng. & Minoo Shariat-Zadeh, P.Eng.
Coming soon
Polar Icebreaker: From Concept to Delivery
Presenters: Jessica Fetterman, P.Eng., Chris Hall, P.Eng., Matthew Hayne, P.Eng., & Benhur Pereira, P.Eng.
Coming soon
Designing for a Changing Climate: Integrating Risk, Resilience, and Professional Responsibility into Engineering Practice
Presenters: Parvin Asadi, P.Eng.
Climate change is no longer a future consideration, it is a current design parameter. Engineers are increasingly expected to account for evolving climate risks while upholding their professional responsibility to protect the public and the environment. This session explores how climate projections can be integrated into engineering workflows to improve resilience, reduce performance gaps, and support defensible decision-making. Participants will gain practical tools for climate risk screening, documentation, and stakeholder communication, enabling them to incorporate resilience into projects while aligning with ethical and regulatory obligations.
Engineering Inclusive Cultures That Last: Policies, Practices, Leadership
Presenters: Ashley Kairu, EIT & Stacy Kairu
Engineering organizations are asking the right questions about diversity, but not always about belonging and inclusion. Drawing on research and workplace examples, the presentation will examine how team dynamics, leadership behaviours, and organizational systems influence belonging in technical environments. Participants will gain practical strategies to design cultures that improve retention, strengthen collaboration, and enhance performance. Led by co-founders of BIPOC Women’s Society, a professional community supporting women of colour, this session bridges lived experience with industry insight. This session delivers actionable strategies engineers and geoscientists can use to build workplaces where diverse talent is retained, grows, and advances into leadership.
Engineers and Geoscientists BC’s Truth and Reconciliation Strategy: Listening, Learning, and Leadership
Presenters: Sneha Satheendran & Ailene Lim
Coming soon
Reverse Mentoring: Building Empathy and Increasing Understanding
Presenters: Marcie Cochrane + McElhanney
Coming soon
Speaking Up Is Part of the Job: Psychological Safety and Professional Accountability
Presenter: Apsara Telwatte
Psychological safety is often discussed as a driver of teamwork, trust, and innovation. In professional practice, it also plays another critical role: helping people raise concerns, challenge assumptions, admit uncertainty, and surface risk before issues escalate. This session will explore psychological safety through the lens of accountability, with a focus on the everyday moments when speaking up matters most. Participants will consider why people hesitate to raise concerns, how accountability and psychological safety reinforce each other, and what individuals, teams, and leaders can do to make respectful challenge a normal part of the job. Through practical examples and reflection, attendees will leave with simple language and tools they can use to support earlier, clearer, and more constructive conversations in their own workplaces.
Top Discipline Cases
Presenter: Cheryl Cuddie & Jake Schroeder
Coming soon
Voluntary Sustainability Program for Registrant Firms
Presenter: Virginie Brunetaud
Engineers and Geoscientists BC is developing a new Sustainability Program specifically for registrant firms interested in advancing their sustainability journey. The voluntary program will build on the existing Permit to Practice Program and is anticipated to be soft launched in Fall 2026. It will provide tools, training and guidance on various sustainability topics to help firms incorporate sustainability in their professional practice. This presentation will briefly describe how the program was developed. It will detail the benefits and potential outcomes for firms willing to participate in this program and the process of enrolling.
Don’t Take It for Granite: The Path to P.Eng. and P.Geo. Licensing
Presenter: Vicki Charman
Coming soon
From Bylaw to Practice: Applying Engineers and Geoscientists BC's Risk Assessment Framework
Presenters: Amy Fehr, P.Eng. & Marg Latham, P.Eng.
Coming soon
Resilient Electrification: Field Insights, Code Evolution, and Incentives
Presenter: Jeremy Overton, Jason Rowley, & Tjasa Demsar
Coming soon
Trends and Common Findings from Compliance Audits
Presenters: Thiago Fernandes, P.Eng., Jodie Miller, P.Eng., Mira Nasser, & Dr. Krupal Pal, P.Eng.
Coming soon
Communicating with Clarity and Speed
Presenter: Eric Tung
Coming soon
Human Edge Leadership in the Age of AI
Presenter: Ralph Kison, Jeret Unger
Technical expertise opens the door to your career, but it is your human skills that will determine your leadership trajectory and positive impact on others. As AI reshapes the highly technical professions of engineering and geoscience, the leaders who focus on growing their emotional intelligence in self-awareness, strategic adaptability, cultural adeptness and human-centric communications will stand apart. This session explores why the future belongs to professionals who can engage people, build trust, navigate ambiguity, and lead with clarity. Attendees will gain practical insight into the human side of leadership success, including how to strengthen relational prowess, communicate with impact, and influence others effectively for both individual and organizational success.
Learning Outcomes: Participants will leave this engaging one-hour session with the following take-aways:
- Identify at least three human-centered leadership skills that will increasingly differentiate engineers and geoscientists in an AI-shaped professional environment.
- Uncover up to three personal communication or listening blind spots that may be limiting trust, influence, or team effectiveness.
- Discover three practical strategies to improve active listening, relational effectiveness, and communication clarity in workplace interactions.
- Create a next-step action commitment to strengthen one of their key leadership areas within the next 30 days, such as: establishing greater trust, improving communication, influence or impacting team effectiveness.
Manage Your Reaction Before It Manages You
Presenter: Monica Chang
Coming soon
Neurodivergent Strategies for Work: Communication, Self-Support, and Sustainability
Presenter: Heather McCain
This session is designed for neurodivergent professionals working in environments that are not always built with their needs in mind. Together, we will explore practical ways to communicate your needs, manage daily work expectations, and move through common challenges such as overwhelm, unclear expectations, and difficulty getting started or finishing tasks.”
We will look at how workplace norms and unspoken expectations can create barriers, and how to respond to them in ways that are realistic and supportive. Participants will learn communication strategies for asking for what they need, setting boundaries, and navigating conversations with colleagues and supervisors.
Using real-life examples, this workshop will walk through situations many people face at work and offer strategies that can be adapted to fit your own strengths and working style. We will also explore tools for organizing tasks, managing time, and reducing stress when demands feel unclear or too high.
There will be space to reflect on how workplace experiences can affect confidence and mental health, including the impact of self-doubt and internalized pressure. Participants will be supported in identifying approaches that are more sustainable and aligned with how they work best.
Led by a neurodivergent facilitator, this session offers both practical tools and a supportive space to learn, reflect, and connect with others who may share similar experiences.
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What past attendees say
Jennifer
2025 conference attendee
“I attend [...] every year, because I really enjoy the conference and I get a lot out of it in terms of networking and education. I've attended the keynotes and a lot of good sessions, and I've gathered a lot of information I can bring back to my organization."
Engineers and Geoscientists BC respectfully acknowledges that our office is located on the unceded ancestral territories of the xʷməθkʷəy̓əm (Musqueam), Sḵwx̱wú7mesh Úxwumixw (Squamish Nation), and səlilwətaɬ (Tsleil-Waututh) Nations. As a provincial regulator, we are grateful to have the opportunity to operate and serve across a diverse province of over 200 Indigenous communities.