Late-bloomer donates $100,000 to new med school

Nuns tossed Marque Allen out of grade school for misbehavior, and high school teachers told him he wasn't "college material." But Glassboro State College biology professor Richard Meagher saw something else: a future doctor.

"He saw something in me at the time when I did not," said Allen, now the foot and ankle physician for the NBA's San Antonio Spurs. "His vision and the opportunities he presented to me changed my future."

Today, Allen, 43, who grew up in Lindenwold, donated $100,000 to start a scholarship in Meagher's name at the new Cooper Medical School of Rowan University. He hopes the gift inspires others to contribute.

Allen, who was in town for Thanksgiving with family, surprised Meagher with the news at a private luncheon on campus.

"If, a year from now, all that's sitting in there is my $100,000, I'll be disappointed," Allen said. "My story is as simple as it gets. I want the common person to identify with me, and maybe this will move him or her to donate."

Gov. Corzine signed an executive order in June to establish a four-year medical school in downtown Camden run by Rowan and Cooper University Hospital. It will replace a two-year program run in Camden by the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey.

The medical school plans to admit its first class of 40 students in 2012 and grow over time to an enrollment of 400.

Rowan will construct a $100 million building at Broadway and Benson Street, part of Cooper's expanding campus and the redevelopment of the Cooper Plaza-Lanning Square neighborhood.

The school's goal is to raise $4 million in scholarship money to cover the first class' four-year tuition - $25,000 a year per student - as Rowan did for its first class of engineering students in 1996, university president Donald Farish said.

"This gift is a vote of confidence in the university," he said. "Marque understands that the education he received - heavily subsidized by the taxpayers of New Jersey - gave him a platform to move forward."

Often forgotten in the current health-care debate is the high-cost of medical education, said Annette Reboli of Cooper University Hospital, the medical school's acting dean. Scholarships reduce students' debt and allow them to pursue lower-paying professional specialities, such as primary care.

Allen's donation will assist a student who earned a bachelor's degree from Rowan, university officials said.

Allen "barely graduated" from the former Overbrook High School in Lindenwold in 1984, he said. With a grade point average of 1.64 out of 4.00, he ranked 303d among 309 students.

"I never saw algebra in high school. I never even took the SATs," he said.

He followed a friend to Gloucester County College, where remedial classes set the foundation for learning, he said. "Something in me and academics started to click there."

By the time he settled into Meagher's mentorship at then-Glassboro State, the biological-sciences major had a 3.8 average and was headed for magna cum laude.

"He was a bit of a rabble-rouser, an instigator," Meagher said today, smiling. "He got along well with everyone. He was a good student."

Shortly before graduation in 1991, Allen was still "naive to the academic world," the physician said. He shrugged off Meagher's suggestion of medical school. "I told him, 'That's for really smart people.' "

Meagher arranged a $750 scholarship to pay Sylvan Learning Center to prep Allen for his med school entrance exam - known as the MCAT - and coached him through applications and interviews.

"I didn't even know what the MCAT was," Allen said. Meagher "essentially held my hand."

The one-on-one coaching worked - for Allen and others. During his 38-year tenure, Meagher, who developed Rowan's premed program in 1970, helped more than 300 students enter professional schools, the university said. He also advised medical-technology and allied-health students. Meagher, of Glassboro, retired in 2007 but still teaches part time.

"Next spring will be my last course," he vowed today.

Allen attended the Temple University School of Podiatric Medicine, the University of Pennsylvania, Thomas Jefferson University Health, and the University of Texas Health Science Center.

Now a podiatric surgeon, he works with five other doctors in a busy sports-medicine practice in San Antonio. He spends most of his time treating ankles sprained or broken on the football field.

"It's a rite of passage for males in Texas," he said. "It doesn't matter if you have no talent at all: Everyone plays football."

In addition to tending the Spurs, the practice cares for athletes from the WNBA Silver Stars, AHL San Antonio Rampage, four universities, and more than 30 high schools.

Allen said he also had been inspired by wife Yvette's family to establish the scholarship fund. One of her grandfathers, former Democratic Rep. Henry B. Gonzalez, was the first Hispanic elected to Congress. He served from there 1961 to 1999, championing civil rights and public housing.

"It's in both of us to give," Allen said. "Ours is not a silver-spoon-in-your-mouth story. We both started at community college. . . . The resources are there. Everyone can be successful."