Gary earned eight varsity letters while participating in baseball, basketball, football, golf, and track at Cedarburg High School.  In football he was recognized as a First Team All-Braveland Conference quarterback in 1966.  In addition to his All-Conference honors, Gary was voted team captain and most valuable player by his teammates, and was also special mention All-State.

Gary was the 1966 senior class president, as well as a member of the Latin Club, German Club, Student Council, Badger Boys State, the National Honor Society, and Lettermen’s Club.

Gary was a 1972 magna cum laude graduate of Northwestern University and received his master’s (1974) and Ph. D. (1977) degrees from the Medical College of Wisconsin.  He pursued a postdoctoral fellowship between 1977 and 1979 in Clinical Microbiology at the University of Oregon.

He then moved to the University of Massachusetts Medical Center, where he received the Outstanding Medical Science Educator Award during 14 of his 18 years at that institution.  In 1995 he received the distinguished Becton-Dickinson Award from the American Society for Microbiology.  Dr. Doern is a University of Iowa Professor Emeritus in Clinical Microbiology and Pathology.