The Loss of a Student Becomes a Force for Good

Michigan Tech 'Latest News'

John Wheeler’s untimely death provides impetus to educate youth, spread word of professions in forestry and natural resource management.



A program to educate high schoolers about professions in forestry and natural resource management. A playground in the woods. A white oak to provide a shady spot for students to sit. All of these were done in honor of John Wheeler.
Wheeler was a fourth-year student at Michigan Technological University when he was killed in a car accident in November 2016. He had aspired to become a forester and was cherished by family, friends and faculty alike.
Terry Sharik, dean of the School of Forest Resources and Environmental Sciences, reached out to the faculty who had John in their fall 2016 courses and asked that they turn in John’s final grades, enabling Michigan Tech to posthumously award him his bachelor of science degree.
“He was extremely proactive and intelligent as a student. He was a real leader in our group,” says Matthew Kelly, an assistant professor of natural resource management, who had John in several courses, including senior capstone. “His peers talked at our memorial about his fieldwork; he was always trying to do it faster, more efficiently and more effectively.”
Kids in the Woods
Just as John pushed himself, the SFRES and wider communities wanted to do more to honor John’s memory and commitment to his future profession.
Sharing his love of the woods was a passion, and John made time to reach out to students at Houghton High School to encourage them to pursue a degree from SFRES and to work in an after-school program at Houghton Elementary.
To continue John’s mission to share the possibility of a career in forestry or environmental sciences, shortly after his death the John H.F. Wheeler Memorial Fund project was established on Superior Ideas, a crowdfunding website operated by Michigan ...

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