Here is my short form resume:

I graduated from Temple University in 1976 with a degree in Physics and a teaching certificate.  I became a high school Physics teacher just after I graduated and remained in that wonderful job for 4 years.... and I do sincerely mean.. wonderful. 



( It's a little scary looking back 30 years and comparing pictures.  As you can see I still have my hair and remember, this is not a student ID card, I was the Physics Teacher. )

I went back to night school while teaching during the day and graduated for a second time in 1981 from Drexel University with a degree in Electrical Engineering.  In 1979 I left teaching and entered industry.  At the core of it all, I am a software designer with applied physics and electronics.  I entered the world of automated electronics test, first in printed circuit board fabrication and then later (1990) in semiconductor test, where I still am today. 

One notable claim to fame is that, sometime in the mid to late 1990's, about 1/3rd of all of the hard drives produced on the planet were being tested through 'read channel device' test software that I had written.  I watched data storage go from Megabytes per dollar to Gigabytes per dollar and I take some pride in the fact that I had some hand in that progress.  By the way, today we are approaching Terabytes per dollar.  What does this mean?  Music, Movies, high compression data storage all available on your local desktop for affordable prices.

In my present job as Chief Engineer I work on creating tools to perform very high speed production of radio frequency devices and measure parameters that occur in less than 1 trillionth of a second.  The net effect of all of this is to be able to produce highly integrated devices for disk drives, cell phones, plasma TV, computer systems in a way that the consumer can appreciate the quality and cost.  That is the bottom line of the industry that I am part of.

My more complete professional resume can be found here.

In February of 2005 I decided to run in a town election to become a member of the Wayland Board of Selectmen.  In that election there were two open seats and two candidates available.  Both candidates were elected by default and I have served on the board since that time with my term expiring in April of 2008.

Serving in public office is both challenging and rewarding.  I can see that many people in our town government spend lots of their personal time and energy in the quest to make the right decisions for the town as a whole and the compensation that they receive for doing the town's work is both the knowledge that they are giving back to their community and additionally, speaking in my case, with the knowledge that I am gaining experience and knowledge in areas that I would have never been able to touch in either my private or professional life.  When people ask me "why did you want to become a selectman" I like to quip... "it makes me a more interesting person".. turns out that its true.  I find I have a lot more useful stuff to say and people like to listen.  But I always try to remember that one cannot be a good listener if they are always talking... so becoming a selectmen has also taught me how to listen.

I'd like to hear from you and part of the reason why I have set up this website is so that you can talk to me.

If you would like to do that then email  Alan@AJReiss.com

This website's introductory article was printed in the Wayland Town Crier on 1/4/07.

Also, my full previous download site of all the documents that I have collected can be accessed from the top level by clicking here.

Please note that this is the personal Website of Alan J. Reiss and although I am a current member of the Wayland Board of Selectmen, the opinions, views, data, presentations and calculations displayed and offered by this website are not necessarily the opinion of any other member of my board or that of any other members of other boards.  The converse to this is that there may be lots of other people who agree and support the conclusions and opinions expressed by this, my personal site, but it's up to them to let you know that.