At her middle school science fair, 11-year-old MaryTherese (MT) Gehrmann wandered into a room hosted by University of Iowa Health Care's STEM outreach team. She didn’t know it yet, but that room — and what happened inside — would stay with her for more than a decade.

The event facilitators gave the students lotion, told them to rub it in, and then had them wash their hands. When the students returned, the volunteers shined a blacklight over their fingers, revealing every spot they missed.

“It’s a core memory in my head,” Gehrmann says. “I don’t remember much else from that fair that day, but I remember that room.”

Gehrmann and her friend began a friendly competition over who could wash their hands better.

“It was super fun and super fascinating,” she says. “We were 11 years old, and we were hooked.”

For Gehrmann, now a third-year medical student at the University of Iowa Carver College of Medicine, this early experience illuminated new opportunities. 

“My parents don’t come from a STEM background,” she says. “These programs were my way in.”

Discovering possibility in a rural state

Growing up in Bettendorf, Iowa, Gehrmann attended STEM camps, science fairs, and school-based activities.

“I was just fascinated by it,” she says. “STEM made science feel cool, fascinating, and inviting. It showed me it wasn’t all scary numbers.”

As she grew older, those moments shaped her view of what was possible — and who science was for. That access is especially important for students from rural and underserved communities, who may have never met anyone working in medicine. UI Health Care invests in STEM education programs designed to inspire interest in health careers among young Iowans.

“We want them to see that anatomy, biology, physics — these aren’t just classes, they’re the building blocks of a health career,” program coordinator Susie Green says.

Since 2009, UI Health Care’s STEM programming has engaged nearly 200,000 Iowa students across almost 1,800 events. Between July 2024 and June 2025, the programs reached 24,508 students from 35 counties, with 37 programs specifically targeting rural or underrepresented groups.

Each year, UI Health Care hosts a free annual STEM event for middle schoolers. The event, now called Kids Go STEM, features interactive sessions on about chemistry, physics, neuroscience, and other topics.

“Middle school is a pivotal stage when students begin to narrow down their future interests and can guide their selection of high school courses,” says Emily Hagedorn, administrator of UI Health Care’s STEM education programming. "We’ve seen thousands of kids come through who didn’t have health care role models at home, and this gives them that first spark. We’ve had kids come in from counties that haven’t sent anyone to med school in a decade.”

The next step is Teens Go STEM, launching in March 2026.

“By launching in March, we want students to focus on their high school curriculum choices,” Green says. The program is designed to help teenagers see how their high school courses connect to future careers in medicine.

A full-circle moment

When Gehrmann began medical school, she immediately signed up to volunteer with UI Health Care STEM programs.

“It’s just my favorite,” she says. “It made such a huge impact on me as a kid, and I want to give that same experience to other students.”

But the moments that stay with her most are from underserved classrooms. Seeing kids’ curiosity unfold in real-time reminds her why these programs matter — and why she keeps coming back.

“These programs give kids opportunities they might not have at home or in school. It lets them step into a doctor’s shoes for a day and feel like they belong there,” she says. “STEM lets kids feel empowered. They can be a chemist, a doctor, an engineer, even just for a day.”

She says the children are curious and engaged, typically ask lots of questions, and want to stay longer than the scheduled time slot.

“We give them a resource they don’t have in the classroom,” she says.

Why STEM matters for Iowa's future

STEM outreach isn’t just hands-on fun. It’s a long-term strategy to build Iowa’s future health care workforce. Iowa currently ranks 42nd in the nation for doctors per person. By 2030, it could lose 15% of its primary care physicians, with rural counties expected to lose 30%. In a state where many rural counties have limited access to physicians, planting these seeds early can significantly impact lives and communities.

For Gehrmann, that sixth-grade glow-germ lab is no longer just a core memory. It’s a blueprint for what she hopes thousands of Iowa kids will get to experience next. The way she sees it, the state’s future physicians, scientists, and health professionals might be sitting in today’s middle school classrooms, just waiting for someone to hand them a pair of gloves, a stethoscope, or a blacklight.

That mindset guides Gehrmann’s advice to kids who are curious about medicine but are unsure.

“Just try it,” she says. “Take a step into the white coat for a day. Try the electrodes,
see what microbes you can find in a creek, look into the microscope. Just try it.”