By her own admission, Lauren Lauterbach was practically born with a golf club in her hands – and she has the baby pictures to prove it.
Golf has always been a way of life for Lauren. Weekend rounds with her father and his buddies led her to playing on her high school team in Wisconsin and walking on to the Wake Forest Women’s golf team her freshman year in college. She left Division 1 golf after one year when the time commitment took away from her studies and jeopardized her long-term goal of becoming a physician.
Lauren still wanted to give back to the game she loved so she started volunteering as a coach at what is now First Tee — Central Carolina. She coached twice a week at their after-school program and became a lead coach in her third year with the chapter.
After graduating from college, she moved back to Wisconsin and worked at a level 1 trauma
center for four years gaining experience in the field she hopes to practice medicine in the future.
When it came time to choose a medical school, she picked the one that best fit her: Des Moines
University. In looking for an activity that wasn’t school related, she Googled First Tee Chapters
in Iowa and found us. Lauren coached at our Warrior Run program in Norwalk, helped with the
Mother/Daughter outing at Woodland Hills, and you’ll often find her helping at our Girls Golf
program.
She gets great satisfaction when a concept or idea “clicks” for a student. “I love the Nine Core
Values,” said Lauren. “Teaching them to the kids is a good reminder to be using them in my own
life. No other sport exemplifies values like honesty, integrity and perseverance. You are your
own referee and responsible for your own mistakes. You must let it go and move on. I’m still
working on that.”
Lauren has been accepted into the Health Professionals Service Program with the Navy.
Through this program her medical education will be paid for, and she will serve at least four
years of active duty with the Navy after graduation from Des Moines University. “My goal in life
is to help, serve, and use my talents to the best of my ability.”
She relates, “I’ve been told you need to find things to ‘fill up your cup.’ Working with the girls and
kids fills up my cup.”
We can’t thank Lauren enough for her time and effort in caring for our participants and helping
us Build Game Changers.
If you’re interested in becoming a First Tee coach, contact our program director, Mikayla Olson
at [email protected].