When she graduated from Western Michigan University in 2009, Bethany Beelen was filled with pride as she shook then-President John M. Dunn’s hand and received her diploma emblazoned with his signature.
Now, 11 years later, Beelen is a first-year student at WMed and that sense of pride has been renewed as she learned she was named a recipient of the John M. Dunn Endowed Scholarship, an award that, since 2018, has benefited several WMU alumni at the medical school.
“His name is the one that’s on my diploma and now that his name is also on this scholarship, it’s really special,” Beelen said.
The Dunn scholarship helps offset medical school expenses for WMU graduates pursuing their ϲʿֱ degree at WMed. The scholarship fund was established in 2017 to honor Dr. Dunn for his significant contributions to WMed and was announced at the 2nd Annual Imagine Gala. The scholarship fund was made possible through the charitable support of the medical school’s healthcare partners – Ascension Borgess and Bronson Healthcare – as well as members of the WMU Board of Trustees, the WMed Board of Directors and community members.
For Beelen and other WMU alumni who are now at WMed, the Dunn scholarship serves as more than just a financial gift. It is a reminder of the impact Dr. Dunn had at WMU, of how their time at the university prepared them for medical school.
The journey that brought Beelen, 35, to WMed was one filled with twists and turns. The Grand Rapids native earned a music education degree from WMU and had plans to teach and pass on her love of music to her future students. Student teaching revealed to her, however, that her future career was going to differ from her college major and she spent the next few years after graduation teaching English in South Korea.
She returned to the U.S. in 2012 and began working on her prerequisites for medical school and took the MCAT. She was accepted to WMed in 2016 but shortly after that, she learned she was pregnant with her first child and put her plans for medical school on hold. She spent the last four years raising her two daughters, now ages 3 and 4, and her dream of becoming a physician was never far from her thoughts.
Now, as a member of the ϲʿֱ Class of 2024, Beelen said she is thrilled to be at WMed following in the footsteps of her grandfather, who was a physician. She is also thankful, she said, for Dr. Dunn and the financial support that the scholarship bearing his name is providing her during her journey through medical school.
“I’m a non-traditional student and I’m feeling the pressure of having more people relying on me,” Beelen said. “I’m extremely grateful for every bit of help. I’m so impressed with the culture at WMed and I’m so grateful for it.”
Beelen was among more than a dozen WMU alumni at WMed who received the Dunn Endowed Scholarship this year.
Second-year student Matthew Kornas, a 2019 WMU graduate, said the financial impact of the scholarship is significant. For Kornas, who grew up in Oakland County, the scholarship serves as a reminder of how supportive the Kalamazoo community is of WMed and why he has come to love the city.
“Over my time here, I’ve just come to really appreciate not only the university and WMed, but the surrounding Kalamazoo community,” Kornas said.
M1 Monty Randhawa echoed Kornas’ sentiments. Randhawa, an Illinois native who later moved to the Kalamazoo area with his family, graduated from WMU in 2018 and spent time volunteering in the emergency room at Ascension Borgess Hospital and working as a scribe at a local clinic in Kalamazoo. The experiences fueled Randhawa’s desire to pursue a career in medicine, and he said he knew he wanted that pursuit to take place at WMed.
“I just wanted to stay in Kalamazoo,” Randhawa said. “I really like this community and the scholarship is a reminder to me that Dr. Dunn really cares about WMed students and we are actually building and supporting people from this community.”
“That means a lot,” Randhawa added. “Dr. Dunn is the main reason why this medical school is even a thing. He is supporting this community and he wants all of us to be lifelong learners.”
M2 Kori Mecklenburg said the support from Dr. Dunn and the Kalamazoo community is an inspiration and provides her with the motivation she needs to navigate the rigors of medical school.
“Dr. Dunn was also my white coat sponsor,” said Mecklenburg, an Edwardsburg native who graduated from WMU in 2019. “All of this is just a reminder of how much the community cares about the medical school and it’s motivational to keep going. It really has meant a lot and going through the first year of medical school has only made me more confident that this is where I’m meant to be.”