Prepared to Serve:

University of Mary Fulfills Calling through COVID-19 Crisis

BY RUTH WIECHMANN

COVID-19 has brought major changes to our families and communities. Markets are unstable. Basic supplies like toilet paper are not in stock at our stores. Sports events, from the NBA to grade school, have been cancelled. Worship services, weddings, funerals, birthday parties, jobs and education have all been affected by the drive for social distancing to slow the spread of the virus.

One thing that has not changed through all the uncertainty and upheaval is the mission of the University of Mary in Bismarck, North Dakota, a mission focused on prayer, community and service.

Benedictine Sisters who came to Dakota Territory in 1878 saw the need for quality healthcare in the remote, rural community and surrounding area; for over a century they have served a large area in these still-remote and largely agricultural communities in the Dakotas. In Bismarck, they founded the first hospital in Dakota Territory in 1885, treating such patients as Chief Sitting Bull, Teddy Roosevelt and Medora de Mores. St. Alexius Hospital was built at its present site in 1911 and a nursing school was founded in 1914 that eventually became part of Mary College, now the University of Mary. The sisters continue to play an integral part in serving the healthcare needs of the people in and around Bismarck through three hospitals, a nursing home and numerous clinics, and through the School of Health Sciences at the University of Mary.

While most people were still relegating COVID-19 to a hyped-up news story, University of Mary leadership was already keeping it on their radar.

“We have a campus in Rome,” said Jerome Richter, Executive Vice President of the University and a member of the President’s Council. “When COVID-19 moved into Italy we were very concerned for our students, faculty and staff members there.”

They monitored the situation closely in late January through February, watching the disease spread through northern Italy and then move south. As COVID-19 began to pose a threat, Richter met with University of Mary president Monsignor James Shea to discuss what should be done.

“We always make decisions based on principles,” Richter said. “This was no different. ‘Our students are adults,’ Msgr. Shea said. ‘They have parents to help counsel them. They also have a right to their education.’ The guiding principle through COVID-19 would be to communicate all vital information to the students while giving them the freedom to take personal responsibility to make decisions.”

They reached out to the students overseas, letting them know how they saw the situation.

“’If you want to leave, we’ll make it possible for you to continue your education,’ we told them,” Richter said. “We encouraged them that they had the ability to make the right decision. Five or six of them came home, the rest stayed. As the situation deteriorated and it became obvious that it was not reasonable for the rest of them to stay in Italy, we made the offer to transfer them to our campus at Arizona State University in Tempe. They desired community, and we felt that this would still give them a unique experience while helping them to fulfil their courses.”

The situation rapidly changed, however, and before the students’ fourteen day quarantine was over, COVID-19 was making its presence felt in the United States and they had to stay home.

Richter said that the same situation replayed itself on the Bismarck campus.

“’You’re adults,’ we told our students. ‘You have the freedom to decide whether to go home and transfer to online courses or to stay here.’ We were clear about what would change for them if they chose online coursework, particularly for our athletes. Msgr. Shea was very caring and sent the students a letter every three or four days; we communicated as best we could to keep them informed as things changed.

“As the situation spiraled out of control and we saw the NBA, the NCAA and March Madness cancelled along with all college athletics, we knew our athletes’ lives would stop. Probably the saddest, to me, as a former wrestling coach, was our three wrestlers who made the national tournament. They were there and had practiced and were ready to go when it was cancelled an hour before it was supposed to start.

“When we got to the point that Governor Burgum was requesting that public gathering places like gyms and restaurants be shut down and schools across the state were closing, we also made the switch from face to face classes to online classes; our faculty did an amazing job of making this transition in one week!

“Msgr. Shea then met with the students who were still on campus in small groups, so that social distance could be maintained. We knew that there were some who could not feasibly go home, but we also knew that campus life would not be what they were used to going forward. We assured them that they were welcome here but also made it clear what things would look like, and again left the decision up to them. Most of the remaining students went home at this point, but we still have about eighty students here because they had nowhere else to go.”

As all of this was happening, they were also putting together an Emergency Response Team with the help of General David Anderson and set up one residence hall for quarantine purposes and another for the use of medical personnel that would need to come on campus should COVID-19 infect anyone there.

“Since we were already FEMA prepared, General Anderson reached out to the North Dakota Department of Health to let them know that if they needed us for anything we were here and ready to serve in whatever capacity we could.”

Meanwhile, the state was also working on an emergency plan, counting hospital beds and inventorying staff and supplies available, and coming up with a strategy to make sure that everyone who needs healthcare during the COVID-19 crisis will have access to it. Part of this plan included organizing a database of volunteers able to assist with medical care and setting up minimum care facilities, or ‘Tier 3 Hospitals’ in locations across the state to be prepared for the unlikely event that hospital capacity would be overwhelmed.

The opportunity for collaboration presented itself quickly. A couple of days after General Anderson reached out to the Department of Health they called Richter, asking to do a walk through of the Field House at the University of Mary to survey it as a potential site for a Tier 3 Hospital.

Things moved fast. The call came at 10 a.m. on Wednesday. University of Mary staff members including General Anderson and athletic director Dale Lennon met with members of the United States Army Corps of Engineers at one o’clock for the walk-through and by four o’clock they were already laying plywood on the floor of the Field House. By Friday afternoon it was completely set up with 200 beds; the Corps of Engineers and the National Guard provided most of the muscle that made it happen.

University of Mary School of Health Science faculty and staff are ready and willing to help should the need arise.

“All of us here are only one or two generations removed from the farm,” Richter said. “When someone is in need, you don’t think about helping, you help. When there’s work to be done, you do it. Msgr. Shea is an incredible person and has modeled the depth of the agricultural ‘can do’ spirit through this. He grew up on a dairy and grain farm near Hazelton, and four out of the five of us on the president’s council all came from dairy farms. My mom raised 14 of us and milked cows every day, and I think Msgr. Shea has worked even harder than she did through this situation.

“At this point we pray and wait and see what happens,” Richter said. “Our prayer while we wait is that we will never have to use this facility, that the Lord intervenes and stops this virus. We don’t want to have to use this hospital, but if that time comes we are ready to serve.”