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— The late Sister Grace Clare Beznouz, Viterbo nursing school’s first dean
Heather Dietrich wanted a personal nursing education and broad clinical experiences.
That’s why the 20-year-old Mayville, Wis., student chose Viterbo University.
“I wanted a place with a professional academic program and clinical opportunities, and a small school so my teachers would get to know me as a person,” Dietrich said. “That has been my experience at Viterbo.”
Dietrich, who begins her clinical experiences next semester as a sophomore, is one of 409 students in the bachelor of science nursing program at Viterbo. The school has another 199 registered nurses completing their bachelor’s degrees and 66 nurses in the master’s degree program, which started in 1998.
Viterbo’s nursing school is commemorating its 40th anniversary this weekend with alumni returning for a Saturday banquet and a Sunday brunch.
St. Francis Hospital had a diploma nursing program from 1902 to 1970. The hospital program closed because the nursing profession started to push for four-year university training. That’s why Sister Grace Clare Beznouz, a
La Crosse native, launched the nursing department at Viterbo in 1967 and served as its dean until 1989.
Viterbo is one of the largest private college nursing schools in Wisconsin and is the largest accredited program on the Viterbo campus. The school has graduated 3,250 nurses and more than one-third live and work in the La Crosse area. Many Viterbo grads work for Gundersen Lutheran and Franciscan Skemp.
“I think what has set Viterbo apart is the commitment to students to teach holistic nursing care, to take care of the whole person,” said Silvana Richardson, the nursing school’s dean since 1997 and only its third dean.
Rose Kreutz, who also taught at the St. Francis nursing school, was among the first nursing faculty at Viterbo and retired in 2002, but still is an academic adviser and teaches a death and dying class.
“We’re strong on psycho-social concepts — how to interact with patients and be sensitive to their needs,” Kreutz said. “We have a friendly, supportive environment and we offer more clinical experiences than most programs. Our students are well prepared when they leave us.”
The first years of Viterbo’s nursing school were rough, Kreutz said. “We had no money, and it was hard to find faculty. We’ve had some down years, but now we’re going strong with 10 times as many students, and we can’t produce nurses fast enough.”
Richardson said the number of male nursing students has doubled to 10 percent of the graduates. The Army has designated Viterbo as a nursing school of excellence. The school has a collaboration with the University of Wisconsin-La Crosse ROTC program, and 77 Viterbo graduates have become Army nurses, Richardson said.
Connie Delaney, a 1975 Viterbo graduate and now dean of University of Minnesota’s nursing school, said Viterbo has an outstanding reputation in nursing education.
“For me, the faculty had a listening ear and unwavering support of students,” said Delaney. “I liked the environment, it’s faith-based, and there’s an emphasis on service to humanity,” Delaney said.
“At Viterbo, the relationship of patients, families and communities comes first and it is the basis for everything in nursing,” she said.
Julie Bartels, a 1977 Viterbo graduate and administrator for women and children’s services at Franciscan Skemp, said she received the time, attention and personal touch she needed in a nursing school.
“It was a well-rounded program with strong values and a concentration on servant leadership, which was not the buzz word back then,” Bartels said. “The school teaches rapport with patients and what you give and the more you give, the more in turn you get back.”
Shannon Hulett, a 2004 Viterbo graduate who works as a cardiopulmonary nurse at Gundersen Lutheran, said she attended the school based on her aunt’s recommendation. Her aunt, Tammy Verhenkamp, was a Viterbo graduate and now is manager of the medical-surgical unit at Black River Memorial Hospital in Black River Falls, Wis.
“I loved my education as much as my aunt did,” Hulett said. “I learned not just nursing skills, but arts, philosophy and religion for a broader background of life knowledge and experiences.”
As a student, Hulett said she worked as a nursing assistant, summer intern and nurse technician at Gundersen Lutheran.
“There were a lot of opportunities to apply what you learned,” she said.
Viterbo nursing graduates
1971: 35
1981: 70
1991: 43
2001: 105
2006: 161
Current enrollment: 674 — 409 bachelor’s nursing; 199 bachelor’s completion for RNs with diplomas and associate degrees; 66 master’s nursing.
Total graduates: 3,250 — and 1,240 live and work within a 50-mile radius of La Crosse.
A few notable Viterbo nursing alumni
Terry Rindfleisch can be reached at trindfleisch@lacrossetribune.com, or (608) 791-8227.
