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Innovation renewed Generous donor support helps the Wheaton Franciscan Healthcare Center for Clinical Simulation retain its high-tech edge. Three years after its doors first opened, the college’s Wheaton Franciscan Healthcare Center for Clinical Simulation in Clark Hall remains on the forefront of simulation education and at the center of the college’s pre-licensure and graduate curriculum. The center uses cutting-edge technology to help nursing students experience all the intensity of a hospital without leaving campus. However, like any technology, the center’s equipment and software can’t stay cutting edge for long without a little help. “Right now, our biggest expense is technology updates so we can keep the center on par with what our students experience in clinical settings,” says Andrea Petrie, director of development for the College of Nursing. Adds center Director lege. It is a living, breathing part of our students’ education. To keep that going, we certainly depend on the generosity of people who believe in what it’s bringing to our students.” Like
Dan Johnson
Mary Paquette: “Simulation is not a separate entity in the col-
Ethel Moehring, who recently left more than $150,000 to the center’s endowment fund through a bequest from her estate.
In Clark Hall’s clinical simulation center, students such as juniors Megan Masterson (left) and Emily Sigafus grow familiar with medical equipment they’ll encounter in the field.
According to daughter Pam Peters, Bus Ad ’70, Ethel and her husband, Ralph, were inspired to give by their lifelong commitment to Catholic education and health care, having also supported Xavier High School and St. Elizabeth Hospital, both in Appleton, Wis. One of Ethel’s other daughters, Marilyn Boardman, graduated from the College of Nursing in 1967. After hearing about the unique learning experience the center offers to students, Ethel made up her mind. “She jumped all over the idea — she insisted on making arrangements for the contribution, and it was finalized within a few weeks,” says Peters. Her endowment was settled in late 2012, shortly after the center opened, and will be put toward updating the wealth of technology that helps it operate. Personal experiences with the health care system kindled Ethel’s belief in the need for “progressive and conscientious health care,” a belief that fits well with the college’s mission. In fact, while receiving care at St. Elizabeth Hospital in 2014, Ethel met a doctor whose daughter is a Marquette nursing student. Although she had made up her mind to donate, Peters says: “Meeting a doctor who was also familiar with Marquette’s excellence reaffirmed her commitment.” Ethel passed away in late 2014 at age 99. She will be remembered as a generous woman who embodied the Jesuit spirit of Marquette and whose dedication to the next generation of healers will no doubt serve as an inspiration to future donors. — Kate Sheka
“A living, breathing part of our students’ education,” simulation at Marquette can’t stay cutting edge without some help.