Pat Goetz ’15 continues to inspire.
Five years ago, Goetz became the oldest person on record to graduate from University of Wisconsin Oshkosh. She earned her bachelor’s degree in English at age 80 and was celebrated with a special ceremony just for her. It capped a stretch of seven years studying at the University.
“It was such a gift for me to go back to school,” she said at the time. “I wouldn’t trade it for anything.”
Now closing in on her 85th birthday in May, the retired registered nurse and avid writer is living in a Menasha nursing home. Associate English professor Laura Jean Baker, who first had Goetz in a creative writing class in 2011, communicates with her on an almost daily basis.
Laura Jean Baker
The arrival of the coronavirus pandemic and COVID-19—an illness especially problematic for those in their 70s and 80s—brought along a storm of thoughts and fears. Naturally Baker began to write about it.
“Like everybody else in America, I was also worried, angry and fearful,” she said. “Although I was worried for my husband with asthma, my kids’ social isolation, my students’ financial struggles and more, Pat seemed like a kind of totem and a loved one representing all of those things.”
Baker wrote an essay titled An Ode to My 85-Year-Old College Student as the Pandemic Rages On. It was published last week on Shondaland.com, the storytelling website launched by Grey’s Anatomy and Scandal creator Shonda Rhimes.
The piece pushes back on the notion that the elderly should be put in further risk for the sake of the American economy. Goetz’s life story remains unfinished, Baker explained, and her impact on those who know and love her are ongoing.
“It would be too obvious to describe her as ‘like a grandmother to me,’ but Pat is somebody I love like family,” Baker said. “She is my student, but she is also my friend. There’s more than 40 years between us, but we just connect. I think it’s her frankness and honesty—she is always candid—and my own commitment to storytelling.
“Neither of us is much interested in picture-perfect representations of life. She ‘tells it like it is,’ as the saying goes, and I find this absolutely magnetic.”
Another of Baker’s essays, Hope is a Wormhole in the Universe, was published in April by the Chippewa Valley Writers Guild. Past works have been published by Salon and the Washington Post. Her 2018 memoir The Motherhood Affidavits won the Nonfiction Book Award from the Council for Wisconsin Writers.
Learn more: