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Alumni

Erica Coulter '00

As a biology major at Bethel, Erica Coulter knew she wanted to pursue the medical field, yet she wasn’t ready for med school immediately after graduation. So she spent a year in Mennonite Voluntary Service (MVS) in Boulder, Colo., as a medical assistant in a clinic for low-income clients.

“I think that the environment at Bethel encouraged me as much toward voluntary service as toward medical school,” Erica says. “I had a desire to pick a career that was service-oriented, specifically toward international service. MVS cemented my desire to go into medicine and specifically family medicine, which emphasizes forming relationships and seems more applicable to doing service overseas.”

After her year of voluntary service, Erica was accepted into the University of Kansas Medical School, and she is now a second-year resident in the Family Practice Residency Program at Lancaster (Pa.) General Hospital. Her medical interests include the full spectrum of family care, preventive care and international medicine.

She recalls of her decision to attend Bethel: “I needed the individual attention and I wanted teachers who knew me and my strengths and weaknesses. I knew that was the kind of environment I needed, and where I would thrive.”

Laurel Preheim ’69 of Omaha, Neb., is Professor of Medicine, Medical Microbiology and Immunology at Creighton University School of Medicine; Professor of Medicine at University of Nebraska College of Medicine; and Chief of Medicine at V.A. Nebraska-Western Iowa Health Care System.

Staci Wedel ’98 is a pediatrician at Wichita Clinic Bethel in Newton.

Suzanne Wedel ’76 is chief executive officer at Boston MedFlight critical care transport system in Bedford, Mass.