A native of Brevard County, Wadad Brooke Dubbelday '81 graduated from Florida Tech in 1981 with a bachelor’s degree in physics. She went on to earn her M.S. and Ph.D. in electrical engineering and applied physics from the University of California, San Diego (UCSD), both of which she accomplished while working full-time at the U.S. Navy’s Space and Naval Warfare Systems Center Pacific (SSC Pacific), where she has spent her entire 35-year career. In May 2016, Dubbelday was named SSC Pacific’s first chief distinguished scientist, along with being the senior scientific and technical manager for Science and Technology Forecasting, Assessment, and Transition and the Deputy Chief Technology Officer for the Space and Naval Warfare Systems Command (SPAWAR). She began her career at SSC Pacific researching circuit fabrication nanotechnology and has held increasingly responsible positions, both technical and managerial, ever since, with duties in such disparate fields as drug interdiction, transportation and logistics, homeland security, and naval intelligence. In her new role, she will lead strategic initiatives designed to maximize the Navy’s abilities in information warfare technology.
Dubbelday comes from a distinguished Florida Tech family: her father, Pieter Dubbelday, is retired from two decades of service as a professor of oceanography and physics, and her sister, the Hon. Catharina Dubbelday Haynes ’83, is a federal circuit judge in Dallas. Dubbelday and her husband, Jeffrey Ruthberg, have a teenage daughter. The family resides outside San Diego, where Dubbelday is active in competitive equestrian and dressage events.
Florida Tech - B.S. in Physics '81
University of California, San Diego - M.S. in Electrical Engineering and Ph.D. in Applied Physics
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