Working to Create Success for Others

Leslie J. Sawyer

A Legacy of Education and Entreprenural Success

When it came to taking on the top job at Environmental Design International inc. (EDI) in Chicago, Illinois, Leslie J. Sawyer (MA 82) had the business sense and communication skills to serve as president and CEO. She already served on EDI’s Board of Directors for 20 years, and taking over the leadership role seemed to be a natural move. It was also her late sister Deborah M. Sawyer’s (MS 82) succession plan.

Photo by Jennifer Gerard

Deborah, a true trailblazer, founded EDI in 1991. EDI provides civil and environmental engineering, industrial hygiene, construction management, and land survey services in the Chicago area and throughout Illinois, the Midwest and the Mid-Atlantic. After Deborah passed, Leslie’s administrative and leadership skills allowed her to meet the company’s challenges and ensure EDI remained one of the most highly regarded and sought-after small and diverse engineering professional services firms in the area.

“I already knew much of what was needed to run the company – like project management, managing people and large budgets, marketing and community outreach,” Leslie said. “I just needed to acquaint myself with the network of clients,teaming partners and the Chicagoland area.”

Leslie at her desk at Environmental Design International in Chicago, Illinois.

Photo by Tone Stockenstrom Photography, Inc.

Five years later, Leslie has successfully led the company through the challenges of COVID-19 and resulting difficulties.

She is proud that EDI finished 2020 with increased revenue and without any staff layoffs. Her award-winning company just turned 31 years old in February, quite an accomplishment for a small, woman and minority-owned business, especially in the engineering industry.

She credits her strong educational background, beginning with her secondary education at Columbus School for Girls, her undergradutate education at Lake Forest College and her ENMU graduate education with giving her the skills to take on the key leadership role at EDI.

Sisters Leslie (left) and Deborah Sawyer after their ENMU graduation in 1982.

Photo courtesy Leslie J. Sawyer

“It’s important to have transferrable skills, and I had those to succeed with this company,” she said. “I was ready for a new challenge in my life, and I’m excited every day I come to work.”

Leslie had a 30-year career in management and administration for the State of Ohio before joining EDI. In that time, she worked 19 years for the Ohio Board of Regents, the planning and coordinating body for higher education in Ohio, in workforce development, health policy and planning and college access. She helped to craft a funding formula for the state’s seven medical schools.

Also, during this time, she was the state director for college access initiatives, in which she worked to ensure that first-generation, financially disadvantaged and minority students had greater opportunities to pursue and succeed in higher education. That is a mission that continues to drive her today.

The Sawyer family (L-R): William Gregory Sawyer, Deborah M. Sawyer, Leslie J. Sawyer and mother, Betty P. Sawyer.

Photo courtesy Leslie J. Sawyer

As a member of the Associated Colleges of Illinois (ACI) Board of Trustees, Leslie has personally – and through her company – funded scholarships in her and Deborah’s names for minority STEM students enrolled in selected ACI member colleges and universities.

She also has always made annual donations to scholarship funding at all her alma maters, including ENMU. Leslie’s commitment to public service continues with donations to organizations such as the Women’s Business Development Center, Chicago Foundation for Women, Federation for Women Contractors, Chicago Urban League, the DuSable Museum of African American History, SOS Children’s Villages, YWCA Chicago, Friends of the Chicago River and The Greater Chicago Food Depository.

Leslie’s great-great-grandmother Laura B. Pride sent all 13 of her children to college in the late 1800s and early 1900s.

Photo courtesy Leslie J. Sawyer

Leslie has been an active advocate, governing board member and sponsor of Gilda’s Club Chicago, raising funds to provide support services for cancer patients and their loved ones.

Leslie has made it her mission to help provide higher education for underserved youth, especially women and minorities, thanks to the emphasis that her parents Betty P. and William Wesley Sawyer placed on the value of a good eduation. She and her siblings, including brother William Gregory Sawyer (MA 78) – who was recognized by ENMU as an outstanding alumnus of the year for 2021 – found education to be a focus of their young lives. Indeed, higher education has been a mainstay in the family for generations, dating back to their greatgreat-grandmother, Laura B. Pride, in Lynchburg, Virginia. She helped all 13 of her children attend and successfully graduate from colleges across the nation in the late 1800s and early 1900s.

That tradition also includes a great-grandfather, George Dickinson (aka William Scurry) a Buffalo Soldier who taught his fellow troop members how to read and write with books he acquired from Frederick Douglas. He also established a school for “Negro youth” and was one of the early African-Americans to attend Oberlin College in Oberlin, Ohio. Oberlin was the nation’s first university to accept women and not consider race as a factor in admitting students.

Leslie with her 2021 Enterprising Woman of the Year award, given by Enterprising Women magazine.

Photo courtesy Leslie J. Sawyer

Additionally, both of Leslie’s maternal and paternal grandparents owned their own local businesses and passed on their passion for entrepreneurship, determination and sense of commitment to the community to their descendants.

“My siblings and I always volunteered in the community and tutored kids. When I was in high school, I was already tutoring kids in the inner city in Columbus, Ohio, and I continued at Lake Forest College, tutoring low-income students in Chicago inner-city housing developments,” Leslie said. “None of us have kids of our own, but we have several through our work in education and our community involvement.”

“Having had the good fortune to have parents and family that made education a priority instilled in us the drive to be successful in our academic and life goals,” she added. “Our parents also always stressed the importance of giving back to others and the community. So we have the desire to help others pursue and achieve their academic and career dreams.”