‘Tis better to give than receive …
While Luth Tenorio’s recent generous gift may be among the largest gifts to Minnesota State University, Mankato’s nursing program and its students, it certainly isn’t the only gift.
Lori Pickell-Stangel, director of development for the College of Allied Health and Nursing, said the College has numerous generous donors as well as several scholarship programs for future nurses.
“I work with the faculty in each of the departments. I have a list for each one and their priorities and things that we need funding for,” she said.
Here are some of the major fundraising initiatives in place and in progress related to the School of Nursing:
The Midwest Nursing Research Society
Pickell-Stangel says that the Midwest Nursing Research Society is a “very prestigious, respected professional group that holds a research conference every year.” Next year, the organization’s conference will be held in Minneapolis. Minnesota State Mankato consistently has between four and 10 faculty and students who present each year. The conference often looks to local nursing schools for sponsorships.
Given Minnesota State Mankato’s size, the required donation would be $10,000. To that end, Pickell-Stangel says she had looked for a donor willing to help fund that donation. And she found it in Faculty Emeriti, Mary Bliesmer, who spent 33 years at Minnesota State Mankato and retired 13 years ago. Bliesmer has donated $30,000 to fund the University’s involvement in that event for the next three years.
“It was pretty much my second home,” Bliesmer said when asked what the University and the nursing program meant to her.
Pickell-Stangel says securing that funding was important because of the exposure it gives Minnesota State Mankato’s program.
“It is important for faculty recruitment, and also for recruiting graduate students into our DNP program,” Pickell-Stangel says. “We anticipate that the University of Minnesota and South Dakota State University in Brookings will be co-hosts and we want to be at the table with them.”
Scholarships Opportunities
One of the recent additions to the School of Nursing’s certifications offerings comes in the area of SANE, or sexual assault nurse examiner. With many states—including Minnesota—seeing a dearth in qualified and certified nurses to assist with sexual assault cases, SANE-qualified nurses are in demand. In many situations, nursing students or even working nurses find the cost of such certification prohibitive.
Similarly, nursing students interested in obtaining a minor in aging studies need to take more courses, which cost money. Donors or corporate partners to remove financial barriers to this important work are always welcomed and encouraged.
Maverick Family Nursing Simulation Center
Minnesota State Mankato’s state-of-the-art Maverick Family Nursing Simulation Center collaborates with the Center for Workforce Professional Education to offer customized training. As the need for more highly skilled and trained nurses increases, so will the demand for simulation experiences from both students and nurses keeping their certifications in the field. We anticipate a higher demand for these services as well as higher costs for software, equipment, and technology over the next 10 years.
“It's an awesome space and has a lot of opportunities that are not just for the School of Nursing,” Pickell-Stangel says. “It's been used for psychology and many different disciplines across the university. But it's very technologically driven, and you need to always update that equipment.”
Pickell-Stangel said any alumni or corporate partner interested in making a donation to support the Simulation Center should contact her to discuss the options. Working with the development office can open your eyes to the full array of gift, endowment, or legacy opportunities available in the College of Allied Health and Nursing.
“A lot of people think, especially with an endowment, ‘It seems like a lot of money, how could I ever do that?’ But we have people who do that kind of thing all the time. There's a lot of different ways to create a legacy level gift. It's something that can be built toward and together we can make a plan to achieve it.”
The value of giving
Pickell-Stangel urges School of Nursing alumni to consider the impact a gift can have. For a student, it can mean the extra bit of training that could inspire them. For the School of Nursing, it could be exposure for the program or the ability to provide scholarships to students in need.
In any case, a gift can extend the reach of the motivation that led you to nursing in the first place.
“I always like to say: Once a nurse, always a nurse. You can retire or let your certification lapse—but you're still a nurse. And that's not always true of every single major,” Pickell-Stangel says. “These are people who are dedicated and very passionate about their field and what they do. So, if anybody's interested, just give us a call. If we find something you want to donate to, great! If we don't, that's OK, too. There's a lot of different ways for people to give. Sometimes just sharing your career with students to give them an idea of a different path than maybe they originally thought can be pretty amazing too.”
Patricia Young, chair of the School of Nursing, hopes alumni are inspired by gifts such as that one that Bliesmer made and will perhaps consider a gift of their own.
Not everyone can afford to make a $10,000 gift. But Young suggests that donating even an hour’s worth of your time can help. It all counts, and it all adds up.
“If we had 100 alumni who make $40 an hour donating, that'd be $4,000 every year,” she says. And that is significant.
