Benefits of Implementing Standards on the OSAC Registry: Eva M. L. King

In this second testimonial in our series on the benefits of implementation from a forensic science service provider’s perspective, we will hear from Eva M. L. King.

Widely known throughout the quality assurance community, Ms. King is the Quality Assurance Director of the Wisconsin State Crime Laboratories (WSCL). She resides in Milwaukee, WI and has responsibility for quality assurance statewide. She is a member of the OSAC Registry Standards Implementers Cohort Task Group, the ASTM International E30 Forensic Sciences E30.92 Terminology and E30.11 Interdisciplinary Subcommittees, and the Chair of the AFQAM Education and Training Committee. All three laboratories of the WSCL in Milwaukee, Madison, and Wausau, have received OSAC Registry Standards Implementer Certificates!

Eva has been a staunch advocate of standards implementation and an outstanding mentor to other forensic scientists interested in this effort. She has submitted nine updates of the WSCL standards implementation status to the OSAC Program Office and plans to participate in the 2024 Open Enrollment event. Here is what Eva writes about the virtues of implementing standards:

Since OSAC’s inception ten years ago, the Wisconsin State Crime Laboratories have been greatly affected by constructive and very helpful influence not only by the standards that are present on the OSAC Registry but by the great support and leadership of the OSAC Program Office (OPO). The OPO has provided the assistance to understand the OSAC vision, to grow in knowledge of Standards Development Organizations (SDOs) and standards, and to reassure that Wisconsin’s path to standards implementation is not Wisconsin’s alone. This wonderful service that was not available to the WSCL ten years ago has proven to be a part of the foundational care necessary for standards implementation efforts and provided the strong and consistent messages that help motivate and strengthen staff on the journey.

 

 

The WSCL is a part of an organization that is committed to the principles of diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) for all employees. Since embarking on the standards implementation journey with OSAC another form of DEI is present. Staff have come together, united under the standards’ umbrellas, and built a strong camaraderie. Offers of advice, mentorship, and other services from OPO/OSAC Cohort/OSAC committee and subcommittee allow WSCL staff an opportunity to agree on some practices that were not in agreement prior to OSAC’s inception. With three different laboratories, diverging and different practices for similar outcomes were not foreign within the Wisconsin system; however, since OSAC’s inception, Wisconsin has received great support from the OSAC to achieve goals of a quality plan that has brought a vibrant workforce of diversity together who continue to put forth Declarations that Encourage and Inspire (DEI) now and for decades to come.