Glen Oaks Community College delivered for Dr. Scott C. Wetzel, providing him with financial savings, momentum to go on to Michigan State University, and an opportunity to mature as he entered his adult life.
Still a practicing OB/GYN, now with 40 years’ experience, he recalls the path that led him there. Mrs. Gerow, his second-grade teacher, planted the educational seed by sending a letter to his parents –a factory worker and a nurse’s aide who earned her high school diploma the year her son graduated from MSU – telling them to make sure he went to college.
Initially, Wetzel had envisioned studying metallurgical engineering at Michigan Tech; with distance posing a challenge, he then planned on going into civil engineering at the University of Michigan, having been accepted there also.
But one day, either when walking past the Sturgis High School counseling office or from a cross country teammate sharing about a recruitment offer from Glen Oaks’ athletic director, he made the choice to stay local for his early post-secondary education. Offers of both an academic scholarship and an athletic scholarship, the former of which he accepted, cemented his decision.
From the beginning, his teachers were encouraging to him, and he appreciated the small class sizes.
David Gosling took his classes on day trips: to the dunes to study trees and plants along the shore, Northern Michigan, including the Cheboygan area – places Wetzel later re-visited with his wife and children.
Donald Van Zuilen had his students do reading projects; as Wetzel read up on limnology (the study of lakes), he also became familiar with early microbiologists – and his career focus changed.
“I was good in math, but I liked biology better, more likely to directly help people,” he said. After graduating from Glen Oaks with his associate of science degree in 1975, he became a Spartan and earned his bachelor’s degree in microbiology.
His Lansing living situation involved a trailer and a roommate who diligently studied for medical school from 6 a.m. to midnight.
“I had outdoor activities and involvement in a campus ministry, but when I was in the trailer I studied because there was nothing else to do,” he said. Those studies, including for the MCAT (Medical College Admission Test) paid off, and Wetzel was
accepted into Wayne State University’s medical school, where he ultimately chose the field of OB/GYN.
His subsequent career took him to Grand Rapids, Ohio, and now Colorado, where he has lived for the past 15 years. He has delivered numerous babies – “I consider that a privilege” – and performed many surgeries.
Wetzel and his wife Claudia, whom he met in medical school, have six children and 16 grandchildren. In his free time, he enjoys fishing, hunting, and the outdoors.
He is not the only one from Glen Oaks at that time to have gone on to successful careers. He does not know what all his classmates at Glen Oaks have done, but one student in his small, five-person second year math class went on to receive his PhD in Physics at Notre Dame, and another, he has heard, became a nuclear engineer in the Navy. Two of his friends at GOCC became attorneys, and others became teachers, a coach, nurses, and even a major league professional baseball player.“