Ms. McCook is the Division Chief of the Socio-Technical Systems Division within the Information and Communications Laboratory of Georgia Tech Research Institute (GTRI). Ms. McCook is a Principal Research Associate with GTRI with  over twenty years of research management and program director experience. She has successfully directed outreach programs through regional and national Centers funded by numerous federal and state agencies. Her expertise includes technology transfer, outreach, planning, and program management, specifically related to emergency preparedness and response, homeland security, community resiliency, and education. In these capacities, she manages researchers working a variety of programs in learning technology, planning, technology assessment and integration, policy analysis and research, technology transfer, education, training.

Ms. McCook is the Program Manager for Homeland Security/Emergency Response programs at Georgia Tech Research Institute. In support of these programs, she is responsible for a range of projects spanning from outreach, training, exercises, planning, technology development and integration, and policy. She works closely with the State of Georgia in capacities of homeland security and emergency response, including building stakeholder consensus, developing regional response plans and enhancement plans for the State to submit to the Department of Homeland Security, identification of technology needs to enhance emergency response, implementation and assessment of technology programs, and designing and implementing exercise and training programs. Ms. McCook’s experience also includes serving as Associate Director for Technology Transfer and Outreach for EPA’s Hazardous Substance Research Centers/South & Southwest and Associate Director of Center for Emergency Response Technology Instruction and Policy. In these areas she was charged with building consortiums of academia, government, and NGOs to support research and technology transfer activities.