Although a native of Lansing, Travis Mattson moved to the city of Rhinelander in northeastern Wisconsin when she was a teenager. A few years later his parents moved to their family home near Watersmeet, in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan in Gogebic County, where he spent most of his summers growing up. Following graduation from high school, he attended St. Olaf College, a small private liberal arts school in Minnesota, graduating cum laude with a major in chemistry and a concentration in historical perspectives of science and the environment.

Upon graduation he spent a summer doing research on an animal metabolism model focused on rainbow trout livers at the Environmental Protection Agency laboratory in Duluth. He then moved to St. Paul and spent a year and a half working at a dental lab and volunteering at the English Learning Center in Minneapolis, teaching mathematics to Somali and Mexican immigrants. Then he began a job as a chemist in the drug delivery systems division of 3M where he worked until moving to Ann Arbor in the fall of 2008 to attend dental school.

Despite his varied background, Travis was always interested in becoming a dental professional, even from a young age. His mother recently found a paper he had done in elementary school where he had written down his future career goals. It stated: “When I grow up I want to be a dentist!”

When he was in high school and college and started seriously considering various career paths, he found the precise technical aspects of working with his hands in dentistry appealing. “To be able to use my hands and my technical skills to help someone is really exciting to me, and it makes me appreciate how much artistry there is in dentistry,” Travis says. “As I shadowed and learned more about the field, the more excited I became and the more I realized it was the career that I wanted.

“Winning the Michigan Dental Association Foundation Scholarship is a great honor and blessing to help with the costs of my education. I think the debt load of most dental students is daunting when they look toward graduation, so any assistance in reducing that debt is incredibly helpful.”

His plans after graduation are to do either a GPR or an AEGD and then go into private practice. He also intends to become a part of organized dentistry: “I plan to be active in it. When I look at the incredible work done by the MDA it inspires me to be a part of my state dental association and help contribute to the best of my ability.”

Travis enjoys staying active playing intramural sports with classmates, spending time with family and friends, and hunting and fishing at his family home in the UP. He also enjoys road cycling and spending time with his girlfriend and her family on Little Glen Lake.  

Although a native of Lansing, Travis Mattson moved to the city of Rhinelander in northeastern Wisconsin when she was a teenager. A few years later his parents moved to their family home near Watersmeet, in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan in Gogebic County, where he spent most of his summers growing up. Following graduation from high school, he attended St. Olaf College, a small private liberal arts school in Minnesota, graduating cum laude with a major in chemistry and a concentration in historical perspectives of science and the environment.

Upon graduation he spent a summer doing research on an animal metabolism model focused on rainbow trout livers at the Environmental Protection Agency laboratory in Duluth. He then moved to St. Paul and spent a year and a half working at a dental lab and volunteering at the English Learning Center in Minneapolis, teaching mathematics to Somali and Mexican immigrants. Then he began a job as a chemist in the drug delivery systems division of 3M where he worked until moving to Ann Arbor in the fall of 2008 to attend dental school.

Despite his varied background, Travis was always interested in becoming a dental professional, even from a young age. His mother recently found a paper he had done in elementary school where he had written down his future career goals. It stated: “When I grow up I want to be a dentist!”

When he was in high school and college and started seriously considering various career paths, he found the precise technical aspects of working with his hands in dentistry appealing. “To be able to use my hands and my technical skills to help someone is really exciting to me, and it makes me appreciate how much artistry there is in dentistry,” Travis says. “As I shadowed and learned more about the field, the more excited I became and the more I realized it was the career that I wanted.

“Winning the Michigan Dental Association Foundation Scholarship is a great honor and blessing to help with the costs of my education. I think the debt load of most dental students is daunting when they look toward graduation, so any assistance in reducing that debt is incredibly helpful.”

His plans after graduation are to do either a GPR or an AEGD and then go into private practice. He also intends to become a part of organized dentistry: “I plan to be active in it. When I look at the incredible work done by the MDA it inspires me to be a part of my state dental association and help contribute to the best of my ability.”

Travis enjoys staying active playing intramural sports with classmates, spending time with family and friends, and hunting and fishing at his family home in the UP. He also enjoys road cycling and spending time with his girlfriend and her family on Little Glen Lake.