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Heidi Etzel: Future First Citizen from Regis High School

By Kathy Cook Hunter

If you were to take a look at 18-year-old Heidi Etzel’s resume, you’d see an endless list of activities and awards and you’d be amazed by her accomplishments, seemingly wherever she goes. It is no surprise she the Regis High School senior was selected for the 2009 Future First Citizen from the Stayton Sublimity Chamber of Commerce.

“Heidi is outstanding in each of these areas (academic performance, co-curricular involvement, leadership roles, character, community service and involvement) and has had a great and positive impact on the Regis community…” Regis Principal Doug Ierardi wrote in his  nomination letter. 

“I like to be involved and be a part of things,” Etzel said, citing her parents as the example she’s followed for years, such as participating and volunteering in the Relay for Life since she was 7 years old, and her greatest passion, the Oregon Multiple Sclerosis150 Bike Tour, which she joined when she was in sixth grade. Other community activities include being a Red Cross volunteer and donor and helping with Habitat for Humanity and Vacation Bible School. 

Attending a small Catholic high school such as Regis “offers lots of opportunities other schools wouldn’t offer,” she said. “I’m getting a good grounding in the basics at Regis.”

One of approximately 160 students, she participates in sports including cross country, volleyball, softball, bowling and skiing; theatrical productions; the Hi-Q Challenge; student council; and National Honor Society.

She’s won a multitude – 15 in all – of the school’s Top Student awards given each semester. She’s showed excellence in subjects ranging from chemistry to Spanish and English to microcomputer applications. 

And, yes, she likes to be tops in anything she does. “That fits me, I’m definitely competitive,” Etzel said.

Naming her favorite subject, she said, “is tough. It used to be math in general and now calculus, which is challenging but I enjoy it for the most part.” Photography has been her hobby since she was the eighth-grade historian at St. Mary’s Elementary School; she likes it so much she’d like to minor in it at the college level.

Etzel has applied for a number of scholarships and already knows she’s received one from the Elks and one from her college of choice, St. Mary’s College, a women’s school in Indiana. 

“As an undergraduate I will study civil engineering, and in graduate school I want to pursue architecture,” she said. A visitor to a number of large American cities with her family when she was a child, “I became interested in large buildings and how they were designed and constructed,” she said.

Asked what drives her to be a leader, Etzel said she does it for others. “I want to excel at everything so I can be there if somebody needs help in this or that or the other,” she said.

“I’m very honored they selected me,” she said of the chamber of commerce award. “My parents were very pleased, and it was pretty exciting when I came home to tell them.”