May/June 2014 | 7
Greg Ina (left) and Pat Covey (right) congratulate Valerie Locker, the winner of the 2014
Golden Oak Award. Locker was the first female and first DRG employee to win the award.
Well done!
Double the Pride
V
alerie Locker achieved two firsts when
she accepted the Golden Oak Award at
the DITS banquet in February.
For one, she was the first female to win the
Golden Oak Award. And she was the first
Davey Resource Group employee to win the
award as well.
"I was stunned when I found out that there
had never been a female Golden Oak Award
winner or a winner from DRG," Locker says.
"How could that be possible, given the
105-year history of DITS?"
"As for DRG … I was pumped to grab us
some notoriety," Locker adds. "What DRG
brings to the table is potential—in our ability
to learn rapidly, our thirst for improvement
and our desire to innovate with scientific
advancements."
Because camaraderie is so prevalent among
DITS students, Locker's classmates got to
know her pretty well—including her tendency
to hiccup "absurdly loudly." In fact, to begin
her award acceptance speech at the DITS
banquet, Locker said, "There are at least 60
people wondering whether I'm going to hiccup.
So, let me get it out of the way." And with
that, she hiccupped into the microphone.
"It was brilliant," she says.
Locker went from being "terrified" to
spend a month with approximately 60 tree
"guys" to developing great friendships by the
end of the training. "The single most incredible
aspect of DITS, above even the intellectual
challenges, is the network and camaraderie that
develops," Locker says. "Never in my life have
I felt support like that, and I certainly did not
expect the great friendships that developed."
Although others had warned Locker that
DITS was challenging and covered a lot of
material, she didn't know what she was getting
into. "Once immersed in DITS, I realized how
all-consuming the program is… I definitely
returned to my project motivated to put new
ideas to the test, both to provide high-quality
feedback to our surveyors and to create
opportunities for my staff," she says.
DITS was especially meaningful for Locker,
as she was recovering from injuries to both
feet and had experienced only moderate
improvement before attending. "At DITS,
I lived off the energy and enthusiasm of
60 motivated colleagues," she says. Upon
returning from DITS, she used that energy
and ran for the first time in nine months.
In conclusion, she says, "I want to throw
two fist pumps into the air and yell 'Represent!'
for both women and DRG."
Alfonzo Robles inspects
a tree during an outdoor
DITS training exercise.
Jon Streich studies a
tree during an outdoor
training session.
