Academic programs and services in Minneapolis will remain active until the fall of 2020, when complete ownership will be transitioned over to Fairview

At the end of this July, St. Catherine University announced that the Minneapolis campus buildings had been purchased by Fairview Health Services, who would transition into being the new owners of the buildings as St. Kate’s programs move to the St. Paul campus by September 2020. This purchase comes after a long anticipation as to who the buyers would be.

Vince Gertrude, MOAT, '20, decorates the community space at the Minneapolis campus on the first day of classes.

Vince Gertrude, MAOT, ‘20, remains as the last staff person for Student Life on the Minneapolis St. Kate’s campus. This fall, he has been preparing community spaces for St. Kate’s students as well as staff from Fairview Health Services. He does the usual Residence Life work of putting up welcome signs and setting out snacks. Originally from Portland, Oregon, Gertrude came to St. Kate’s to enroll in the Masters of Occupational Therapy program and takes classes on the St. Paul campus while working in Minneapolis.

In the past few months, Gertrude has tried to build community in a campus where it seems like there are fewer and fewer people every day. Moving programs from the Minneapolis campus has been a gradual process, and programs are being moved to the St. Paul campus as soon as they can be accommodated into spaces there.

“All the students on this campus are pursuing careers in healthcare,” said Gertrude, who believes that the Minneapolis campus has a different spirit than the St. Paul campus. “I think telling our own story will help strengthen our sense of community,” he said.

For those who have only inhabited the St. Paul campus, the Minneapolis campus may seem like a secret. However, it has developed its own unique community and culture over the years that it has been in operation, known for its associate programs in healthcare. A look into the history of the Minneapolis campus may help us appreciate what it has been and what it will become as Fairview transitions into being the owners of the Minneapolis campus.

The Minneapolis Campus resides in the neighborhood of Cedar-Riverside, close to both Augsburg College and the University of Minnesota.

A trip across the river takes us to the Cedar-Riverside neighborhood of Minneapolis. The St. Kate’s campus is made up of two interconnected buildings, Old Main and the Education building.

In 1887, the Sisters of St. Joseph of Carondelet founded the St. Mary’s School of Nursing, which was named St. Mary’s Junior College later on, and it was to be a training school for nurses that responded to the lack of nursing programs at the time. In 1986, St. Mary’s Junior College came together as a part of St. Catherine University.

In 2017, the Minneapolis campus property was gifted to St. Catherine University by the Sisters of St. Joseph of Carondelet.

Cort Cieminski, DPT Program Director and Professor has been working at the Minneapolis campus for 27 years. “Our students are gaining something, and our students see the advantage of moving,” said Cieminski. However, he has seen many different phases of the Minneapolis campus, at one time hosting 1800 students in its programs. There had been talk in the air about merging the two campuses before, but it had never been concrete until now.

A typical PTA lab space at the Minneapolis campus. Long padded tables double as desks and places to practice physical therapy exams.

By fall 2020, the Physical Therapy programs will move into Mendel Hall on the St. Paul campus, which already hosts a Human Anatomy lab and will have lab spaces appropriate for their needs.

In the meantime, the Minneapolis campus has seen a slow withdraw of people and resources as programs are being moved piece by piece. Often, the hallways remain empty of students except when a class is being held, and the campus has been generally quiet in the past few months. However, faculty still want to keep things going on the campus and provide a welcoming environment for new students who are starting out this fall. “The people who are in Minneapolis want to make sure that the student experience is a positive one,” said Ciemenski. Student services like the library will continue on the campus until all programs have been moved out of Minneapolis.

The Minneapolis campus will continue to hold classes for St. Kate’s associate and doctorate programs until at least the summer of 2020. In the interim process, Fairview will be utilizing classrooms, conference rooms, and auditorium space for training of healthcare professionals. As the new owners of the building, they will be sharing space and bumping elbows with St. Kate’s students in the shared spaces at the Minneapolis campus. Angela Riley, Executive Vice President & CFO, sees this as an opportunity for networking between future healthcare professionals and current ones. “We looked at Fairview being a natural fit from a history standpoint,” said Riley.

A statement from president Becky Roloff said, “Fairview Health Services is a longtime partner of St. Catherine University, and much of our shared history was written within the Minneapolis campus buildings. It is right and fitting that those buildings become part of Fairview’s future.”

Staff and students alike see advantages in moving to St. Paul, although they will have to leave behind the Minneapolis campus that they have grown to appreciate over the years. “The students in Minneapolis who are now coming over will have access to a lot more services and opportunities and facilities than they have now,” commented Jeff Johnson, Associate Professor of Philosophy.

The campus integration is being carried out in two phases. Phase One has been completed, and the move of the Minneapolis campus is part of Phase Two. To see an updated schedule of the campus integration process and to find out more about what moves will be made, head to the official integration site: https://sites.google.com/a/stkate.edu/integration/home