Haden Metzler ’21 ’22 ’23 attended ĻӰ’s School of Business and obtained a Bachelor of Business Administration with a concentration in healthcare management. Originally, Metzler was interested in becoming a Biology major, but was not sure if that is really what he wanted to do. Although switching majors can be scary, Metzler was sure that Shenandoah was the right place for him.
ٳԲԻDz will support you in whatever you want to do and make sure that you are successful,” said Metzler. “It is such a cliche statement, but at SU you truly are not a number. You get to know your faculty and build relationships and connections, and they know you by name.”
While at Shenandoah, the most rewarding experience that Metzler had was being involved with the School of Business’ Legacy Golf Tournament. Metzler first learned about the golf tournament, after enrolling into a public speaking class during his senior year, which he thought would be an easy grade. However, the Dean of the School of Business Astrid Sheil, Ph.D., told the class that this wouldn’t be an ordinary public speaking class as she was going to have them plan and execute the golf tournament that would hopefully raise money for School of Business scholarships. While he and his classmates didn’t have much experience in event planning, they were still determined to make the event a success and ended up reaching their goal of $20,000.
Since its first year, the Legacy Golf Tournament has grown into so much more with it raising more than $100,000 in 2023 for the School of Business. “This is a hands-on experiential learning [opportunity] for the students, and the community has made it known that this is something worth supporting,” said Metzler. “If you told me on that first day that I would have ended up loving that class I would have laughed, but it truly is my favorite event we put on at the School of Business.”
Metzler is the operations & logistics coordinator for Shenandoah’s School of Business. In this position, he plans and executes all events and projects for the School of Business. These events include the Economic Summit, the Business Symposium, the Legacy Golf Tournament and more. He also manages the graduate assistants as well as work studies to make sure they are getting the most out of their experience as student employees.
Before this position, Metzler was previously both a graduate assistant and part-time administrative assistant to the Dean Sheil before being promoted at the beginning of June 2023. “I am excited that in my role I am able to continue working with the students, the dean and our consultants Anita, Chelsea and Cathy to do something so much bigger than ourselves that will benefit future students for years to come,” said Metzler.
The most rewarding experience of Metzler’s career so far is seeing all his hard work pay off when planning events. After organizing, stressing and running around during event set up, he loves to see the events go off without a hitch. “Sometimes when you are putting on these big events, the smallest hiccups seem like a disaster,” said Metzler. “When you start to hear from the people in attendance how well it went and they can’t wait for next year’s, it is a sigh of relief.”
Shenandoah helped prepare Metzler for his career by giving him hands-on experiences that made him break out of his shell.
Metzler’s advice to students in his profession is to “learn to remain calm in stressful situations or when something goes wrong. Panicking will not do anything, but make the situation worse. Take a second to think and come up with a solution.”