Skip to main content Skip to footer

Devoted SVSU Employees Leave a Lasting Impact

I think Gloria is looking down on us now and is just tickled that so many students will be helped.

    Deborah Rickert
    President, SVSU Support Staff Association


Gloria and Douglas Wagener

Gloria and Douglas Wagener met while working at SVSU, then Saginaw Valley State College, and married in 1977. Gloria spearheaded the movement to unionize support staff members and was an advocate for her colleagues and students at the university. While working as administrative secretary for Career Services, she helped to reshape the department’s approach to student employment. “She treated every person who walked into our office as the most important person ever,” said Mike Major, former director of Career Services and current lieutenant commander at the U.S. Naval Academy. Sadly, Gloria unexpectedly passed away at the age of 67 in 2016.

A scholarship, established in 2012 to support the educational dreams of SVSU support staff and their immediate family members was renamed the Gloria Wagener Support Staff Scholarship in recognition of Gloria’s passion and tireless work on behalf of support staff and SVSU students.

Douglas was a “guy that would do anything for this university and proved it many times over,” recalled Joe Vogl, retired SVSU head men’s golf coach. Doug worked for SVSU for 20 years as the theatre building and technical director. Even when he was no longer able to work following a serious back injury, he continued to support his wife’s SVSU career and union activities.

Before passing away in 2022, Doug committed to a generous $650,000 planned gift to enhance the scholarship’s endowment, and the scholarship was once again renamed to include Doug’s name. In the years to come, the endowment will provide an amazing $28,000 to $30,000 in annual scholarships, rather than a single $1400 annual scholarship as was awarded in recent years.

Recent recipients of the Wagener Support Staff Endowed Scholarship include marketing major Caleb Zastrow, son of SVSU staff member Amy Zastrow and her husband Kristopher, and Anna St. Clair, administrative secretary to the dean of the College of Arts and Behavioral Sciences. Caleb says that he would not have been able to grow as a leader if not for scholarship support, and Anna’s scholarship award enabled her to take more credit hours this academic year so she can graduate sooner.

Even though they came from modest means, Doug and Gloria’s legacy of helping those around them will live on through their planned giving.

For information about making a planned gift or establishing a scholarship, please contact the SVSU Foundation at foundation@svsu.edu or 989-964-4052.

 

CONTACT US.






Foundation
Wickes Hall 398
foundation@svsu.edu
(989) 964-4052