St. Ambrose University nursing students in Davenport participate in a simulation Oct. 17.
By Barb Arland-Fye
The Catholic Messenger
Davenport — Current and future St. Ambrose University nursing students are the beneficiaries of a partnership between their university and the Presentation Sisters of South Dakota, dedicated to rural health care and service through nursing education. The Presentation Sisters contributed $6 million in financial support to St. Ambrose in addition to the sisters’ legacy in nursing education and rural healthcare.
“Today, our stories become one,” St. Ambrose University President Amy Novak told students, faculty, staff, Presentation Sisters and other supporters gathered Oct. 17 for the dedication and blessing of the Presentation Sisters Department of Nursing and the Nano Nagle Online Nursing Program.
“Our collective vision of an education rooted in person-centered care, enhanced by technology and deeply infused with our Catholic social teachings, finds a home in the Spirit of Nano Nagle,” Novak said. Nagle founded the Presentation Sisters in 1775 in Cork, Ireland. Her “pioneering ministry was never bound by geography,” Novak continued, and she “called all who served alongside her to be of service to others in any part of the world.”
“A seedling from the mighty oak of Nano Nagle’s legacy was transplanted and here it will thrive for generations empowering the lives of thousands of nurses as they then bring healing and solace to those most in need,” said Sister Mary Thomas, the Presentation Sisters’ president.
She was unable to deliver her remarks in person because of a death in her family so Sister Vicky Larson, the community’s vice president, delivered them for her.
Bishop Dennis Walsh blessed the nursing department with holy water, walking through the halls in the Center for Health Sciences Education at Genesis in Davenport, accompanied by Father Dale Mallory, St. Ambrose University’s chaplain.
The bishop prayed that the Presentation Sisters and their founder’s “charism of zealous care for the poor, the sick and marginalized will always and forever inspire our nursing students. May the seeds that were planted at Presentation College continue to grow and bear much fruit here at St. Ambrose University under the watchful care and intercession of our patron, Blessed St. Ambrose of Milan.”
Presentation Sisters dabbed their eyes and Novak admitted to feeling a bit choked up reflecting on the journey that led the Presentation Sisters to entrust their nursing education ministry to St. Ambrose University.
Their religious community opened Presentation College in 1951 in Aberdeen, South Dakota to provide nursing education and later expanded its academic programs to include Health and Natural Sciences, and Social Science and Humanities. With heavy hearts, the sisters closed Presentation College in 2023 because of low enrollment post-COVID-19. “The “Sisters did not have bandwidth to try to turn this corner alone,” Sister Thomas said.
The post-COVID-19 years began “our long vigil, our Agony in the Garden — how to be true to our educational calling and mission and be true to the Sisters who founded the college,” she said. “Many of us were personally educated at Presentation College …We loved our college ministry and how it empowered many first-generation students. We made a difference in the lives of thousands of students over the decades. They passed on the blessings they received and the good rippled out into wider circles.”
Through the partnership with St. Ambrose University, “Our Agony in the Garden evolved from dying and letting go to the long wait of Holy Saturday,” Sister Thomas said. It is “a capstone moment to honor a rich and deep heritage, to recognize that the Presentation College ministry was ours to steward for a time and then to have the courage to set it free by entrusting it to St. Ambrose University, who demonstrated they are more than worthy of our act of trust.”
She described the dedication event as a “Resurrection Day as something new has arisen in the Department of Nursing at St. Ambrose University, made possible by the grace of God working through every moment of sacrifice, of generosity, of love.”
Luke Johnson, a senior nursing student at St. Ambrose, expressed gratitude for the partnership with the Presentation Sisters, which he believes strengthens the connection between the spiritual and physical aspects of nursing.
St. Ambrose is a “place where I have learned to become a compassionate, loving nurse who is with people on the worst days of their life,” Johnson said. “Students can embody the Ambrosian values of courage, wisdom, justice and service in this program, becoming the hands and feet of Christ in the healthcare world.”
