About

On behalf of the INCOSE San Diego board, we are excited to serve the chapter and to provide value to our members through our general meetings, tutorials, and STEM sponsorship programs for 2021. Please take the time to thank members of the 2020 board for their perseverance and service.

This continues to be a strong time for our chapter. We received Platinum status in 2018, 2019, and 2020. Local membership remains steady at 220, and looking back at 2020, we started out with in-person events but had to quickly shift to virtual operations by the end of February. Overall, we were still able to host 13 events in 2020:

• Nine presentations, ranging from topics such as: Model Based Systems Engineering (MBSE) in the context of the Scaled Agile Framework (SAFe), Human-Systems Integration, SE lessons learned from Amazon Web Services (AWS), and Training solutions for Cybersecurity education
• A weekend tutorial on DevOps and Systems Engineering
• A virtual STEM event using the Kahoot! Quiz tool
• A 2-track Mini-Conference at the end of the year

Outreach efforts also bore fruit in 2020, as we also welcomed a new INCOSE student division at San Diego State University and continued our participation in the San Diego County Engineering Council (SDCEC).

For 2021, we plan to continue with the positive momentum from 2020 with the following objectives:

• Expand our outreach efforts by conducting joint events with other professional societies and INCOSE chapters
• Continue support for our Ambassadors, Volunteers, and Student liaison programs, with a special focus on introducing early and mid-career professionals to INCOSE San Diego
• Celebrate the multi-disciplinary nature of our profession by exploring the systems engineering challenges and opportunities for domains such as Medical Device Design, Data Analytics, and Cybersecurity
• Prepare to host the 2021 Western States Regional Conference “Sailing the Digital Wave”. This will be an all-hands effort and we could use your help!
• Re-establish a Systems Engineering Professional (SEP) Certification training cohort and possible SEP workshop

We now look forward to providing a great professional society experience in 2021. San Diego chapter events are open to all (discounts apply for INCOSE members) and we would welcome any commitment you can give from your busy schedule, whether as an attendee or as a volunteer. We also promote the next generation of engineers and scientists by fundraising and awarding yearly STEM grants to local schools.

In the meantime, we will continue to conduct our events virtually as our community becomes safer. We plan to carefully (and safely) transition to in-person meetings per CDC, State, and County guidelines. In the meantime, feel free to contact any of the INCOSE Board members or myself (frank.c.lacson@outlook.com) if you have any questions, ideas, or improvement areas about your chapter. Looking forward to meeting you all again!

Frank Lacson,

San Diego Chapter President 2021