Paul Larkin

Paul has been involved in utility locating since 1994 and joined Staking University in 2005. He helped build the original Staking U. field classroom in Port Huron, MI, and has over 20 years of experience with all buried utilities and electromagnetic locating instruments. Paul has held both training and management roles in the industry and now oversees day-to-day operations at Staking U while providing utility locating services nationwide.

Bill Mixer

Bill is a retired college professor and former chair of the Environmental Science Department at Casper College in Wyoming. During his career, he taught courses in water and wastewater operations, distribution and collection systems, ASSE Cross Connection Certification, OSHA trenching safety, and OSHA HAZWOPER. He also provided onsite technical assistance for the USEPA in water and wastewater system operations.

Bill began teaching utility locating in 2006 through a first-of-its-kind public/private partnership with Staking University, One Call of Wyoming, and Casper College. Since then, he has taught locating across the United States and even in Australia. 

Bud Jolly 

Bud received his training in communications while serving in the U.S. Army. Upon entering civilian life, he had a career in telecommunications with GTE for 29 years. Since his retirement in 1999, Bud has worked at Staking U. as Senior Instructor and Director of Training

Mario Mora

Mario brings over 26 years of experience in line locating, standby procedures, and team management. He has worked with Anadarko Petroleum and Western Midstream, overseeing day-to-day operations for Colorado 811 utility locate tickets for both companies. Mario has also monitored locator routes for three different companies and assisted with quality control (QC), quality assurance (QA), and damage investigations.

Dr. Dennis Prezbindowski 

Dennis is the principle GPR instructor for Staking University.
Dennis earned a PhD in Geology from the University of Texas at Austin in 1981 and has extensive experience with shallow and deep geophysical technologies. He is a certified professional geologist and a certified EM utility locator. He has extensive field experience in the use of GPR and other geophysical instrumentation for utility locating and subsurface site characterization. Dennis has presented numerous professional GPR seminars over the last 15 years and has published over 100 peer reviewed professional presentation and technical articles during his professional career.

Read Dr. Prezbindowski’s latest article in American Locator May 2019,
“Depths to Utility Targets as Determined by GPR Imaging: 
A Field Study of Factors that Affect Depth Calculations.”

 Thomas Larkin

Thomas, a Purdue University graduate with a degree in Computer Engineering, has been applying his expertise in utility locating and technology since 2018. He works with Staking University, where he teaches and uses electromagnetic locating, ground penetrating radar, structure scanning, and mapping.

He also has hands-on field experience with utility mapping projects throughout the greater Chicagoland area. Beyond utility locating, Thomas brings additional skills in UAV operation, computer building, various programming languages, and camera work.

Alexis Herrera

Alexis is the newest member of the Staking University training team. He works alongside Thomas and Paul as a trainer in electromagnetic locating and is excited to help grow and improve the training program for future students. A Mechanical Engineering graduate, Alexis is fluent in Spanish and also has experience in construction of modern homes.