Saint Mary's Newsroom
Campus ConnectionAn update from the president to alumni and parents
John (Jack) McClure, Ph.D., dean of the School of Education announces retirement
Dear Faculty and Staff,
With bittersweet feelings and much appreciation, I share that Dr. John (Jack) McClure, Ph.D., has announced that he will retire as the dean of the School of Education, effective December 31. Before coming to Saint Mary’s in 2006, Dr. McClure worked in the healthcare industry for 16 years. At Saint Mary’s, he began as an assistant professor in the Ed.D. program, then was named associate professor and core faculty in 2011, and in 2013 became professor and program director for the Ed.D. program.
Dr. McClure has published many works in the field of education, served on numerous committees and administrative appointments, and received many recognitions for his contributions to Lasallian education. In 2018, he was named Distinguished Lasallian Educator for the Midwest Region. He has focused on a real-world education for a world in need of principled educators and leaders.
Father Burns shared, “I greatly appreciate the impact that Dr. McClure has made within Saint Mary’s and our School of Education. He has consistently stepped forward to lead during times of need and change, supporting our Lasallian Catholic mission at every turn. Countless students, faculty, and staff have pointed to the role that he has played in their journeys, and I am grateful for his dedicated service and love for Saint Mary’s. Congratulations on this new chapter of life, Jack! May God bless your retirement with His guidance, filling each day with good health and happiness.”
I have had the privilege of working directly with Jack over the years, and I have appreciated his dedication, steady leadership, and genuine care and support for our students, faculty, and program directors in the School of Education. On behalf of everyone within the School of Education and the broader Saint Mary’s community, I would like to express our gratitude to you, Jack, for all you have contributed to make our university a special place to work, learn, and grow.
Best Always,
Sue Hines, Ed.D.
Vice President for Academic Affairs
Michelle Wieser, MBA, Ph.D., dean of School of Business and Technology, will depart for global corporate opportunity
Dear Faculty and Staff,
As many of you may be aware, Dr. Michelle Wieser, dean of Saint Mary’s University’s School of Business and Technology, has recently announced her decision to accept a new leadership position with QS Quacquarelli Symonds, a global higher education consulting, research, and enrollment and rankings firm. Dr. Wieser’s last day at Saint Mary’s will be September 12. We extend our sincerest thanks to her for her dedication to our faculty, staff, and students over the past five years. Most notably, she spearheaded the accreditation and reaffirmation process that culminated in IACBE accreditation for the College and 10 SGPP programs.
Father Burns reflected on Dr. Wieser’s contributions, stating, “While Michelle’s gifts and talents will be missed at the university, I am so very pleased that she has secured an amazing opportunity to continue her innovative legacy and to share her business acumen. I thank her for her dedication to Saint Mary’s University during the past five years, particularly her significant contributions to recent IACBE accreditation. She has achieved a great deal. I extend my own, and Saint Mary’s collective, ongoing promise of prayers.”
While I have not had the opportunity to work with you as long as I may have liked, I also offer my appreciation to you, Dr. Wieser, for your dedication and leadership at Saint Mary’s. While your leadership will be missed, I have faith in the deeply committed faculty and staff you supported in the Graduate School of Business and Technology to continue to carry forth their service to our students and the Saint Mary’s community.
Best Always,
Sue Hines, Ed.D.
Vice President for Academic Affairs
The epidemic of human trafficking
Education and prevention is key
Katie Boller Gosewisch B’01 calls herself the queen of “if you see something, say something.”
“I probably win the award for making the most 911 calls,” she said with a laugh.
But in all seriousness, she adds, “Human beings were gifted with intuition. If it feels wrong, it probably is wrong, and what’s the worst that could happen? Someone could be made to feel uncomfortable. But on the flip side, you could have saved someone’s life.”
Boller Gosewisch speaks from experience. As a child, she was sexually abused. During a doctor’s visit, a nurse noted in her chart that the young girl was scared, but the investigation stopped there. Had the investigation continued, her ordeal could have ended sooner.
Now, in her current position as executive director of the Alliance to End Human Trafficking (AEHT), Boller Gosewisch is in a position to help others in abusive situations. And one way is by encouraging all of us to keep our eyes and ears open.
Every day, from her office in Michigan, she works on training and educating people about human trafficking.
The Alliance to End Human Trafficking, started in 2013, is a collaborative, faith-based national network that offers education, supports access to survivor services, and engages in advocacy. AEHT members include over 200 congregations of Catholic sisters, coalitions working against human trafficking, and individuals.
It began as 15 religious Sisters from 15 different congregations came together at the White House and decided that although many congregations of women religious are dedicated to anti trafficking, a national organization was needed.
“We’re focused on education and prevention and we support organizations that provide survivor services,” she said. “The need is really there. We believe we are stronger together.”
Boller Gosewisch received a call earlier in the week about needing a place for a survivor of human trafficking and said that, through networking, they are often able to find a safe place as they have access to so many people and services.
“I’m very big into education and prevention, which is where I spend a lot of time thinking and doing,” she said.
Between webinars and the website, to a United Nations-related speaking engagement, she works on providing resources, training, and prevention efforts.
Those can revolve around teaching children about personal boundaries to educating parents and teachers about the dangers of online child exploitation or missing and runaway children situations, which can very often lead to trafficking.
“A child on the street will likely be approached by a trafficker within a short time frame,” she said.
One of the organization’s biggest projects involves the intersection between human trafficking and forced migration.
“The U.S. Dept. of State found that more than 70% of those trafficked in this country are immigrants,” she said. “If we can do something to mitigate the risk for immigrants once they come into this country, we can help stop this. Traffickers exploit vulnerable people. Immigrants are in a country where they might not know anyone, speak the language, or have legal status to be able to work.
“We’re working on three pieces of legislation that have some chance of making improvements in our immigration system. They have a good chance of making an impact,” she said.
Other ways AEHT combats trafficking include talking with survivors, providing scholarships to survivors, and providing grants to organizations that provide direct services.
Boller Gosewisch reminds us that it’s boys and men being trafficked as well, not just girls and women, and that her organization is also focused on labor trafficking, in addition to sex trafficking.
“There’s more labor trafficking in the world than sex trafficking,” she said. “We are saying, ‘Your life is not as important as my comfort.’ Too often it’s about the right clothing or brand. Are we putting profits above people?”
She explains that the amount of money that traffickers make is increasing and is quickly on course to outpace the illegal drug trade. It has already surpassed the illegal weapons trade.
“The tough thing about statistics is it’s a very underreported crime,” she said. “You have anywhere from the international slavery index which reports 50 million people every day are involved in some sort of human trafficking. Many organizations only look at confirmed cases, those reported to law enforcement, so their numbers will be lower.
“With the pandemic, it went even further underground and a lot more online,” she said, explaining that you can find trafficking on Craigslist and all the social media platforms. “Anyone who wants to find it, can find it,” she said.
Despite the staggering statistics, Boller Gosewisch maintains hope. “The fact we are becoming more aware might seem like it’s getting worse, but that same education is the key to its demise. It is about awareness to the point where people can’t just stick their heads in the sand,” she said. “We need to start using the tools we have to work to end human trafficking. We all need to know the indicators (available on the website) and what we can do, maybe it’s calling a hotline or calling 911 or both.”
The fact that there’s mandatory training for healthcare providers, daycare workers, and others is a start.
“I rejoice over (every survivor story) but I definitely rejoice for every kid who learns about boundaries and how to protect themselves,” she said. “We want to prevent people from being trafficked, so it’s a big victory when we can put in the work to do the prevention.”
Boller Gosewisch said her job combines many of her passions. After earning bachelor’s degrees in history and theology at Saint Mary’s, she went on to get a master’s degree in theology.
She then spent the next 20 years of her career working in ministry and then as an executive director for two Minnesota-based nonprofits: Living at Home Network and WeCab, both of which focused on serving vulnerable populations with important access to resources like transportation, safe and affordable housing, and medical care.
She accepted her current position two years ago because it combined a social services and theological component and because of her long-standing personal desire to protect children.
“I don’t know that I could ever do anything differently,” she said. “I do think the idea of servant leadership was something I really attached to Saint Mary’s. The idea of faith, service, leadership, and community have been very integral to my life. It provides a sense of accomplishment, a sense of great meaning. I don’t think I could be in a nonhelping profession. It’s the way I’m built.”
Rural health care focus
Finding solutions to a national crisis
After graduating with a nursing degree, Carmen Drentlaw D’24 jumped right into her new field at Abbott Northwestern Hospital in Minneapolis. After a few years of working in the intensive care unit (ICU), Drentlaw knew she was ready for a change.
“While I was in the ICU, I worked alongside a lot of nurse anesthetists, and I was impressed by the amount of autonomy that was given to them,” she said.
Drentlaw decided to enroll in Saint Mary’s Doctor of Nursing Practice in Nurse Anesthesia program.
A Saint Rosa, Minn., native, Drentlaw knew she wanted to practice in a rural setting and was drawn by Saint Mary’s focus on placing students at rural hospitals for their clinicals. With students needing to complete 12 different clinical rotations in the program, Drentlaw did five of her 12 at rural hospitals.
“Rural practice is a bit different,” Drentlaw said. “And with autonomy in my job being something I wanted, I wanted to experience rural clinics.”
Rural health care in crisis
Drentlaw is like many studying students from small towns in the field of health care who look to return to their home communities after the completion of their degrees. And at the moment, well-educated health care professionals entering rural hospitals and clinics are desperately needed.
According to a 2023 report from Becker’s Hospital Review, since 2005, 40 rural hospitals in the state of Minnesota have lost certain services and six have closed. A recent report from Axios showed that 45 percent of rural hospitals in Minnesota no longer offer maternity care.
The concern goes well beyond maternal care, with the Minnesota Department of Health reporting in 2022 that rural parts of the state face a “severe shortage” of health care practitioners of all types.
“Simply put, rural health care in crisis,” said Dr. Julie Gauderman, DNAP, the associate director of the Doctor of Nursing Practice in Nurse Anesthesia program at Saint Mary’s. Along with educating the next generation of nurse anesthesia providers, Gauderman has served as the federal political director for the Minnesota Association of Nurse Anesthetists.
Gauderman says the cause of the crisis in rural health care is multifaceted; however, a major driving force is the fact that many rural areas in the U.S. are underserved communities. Many in rural areas rely on Medicaid and Medicare for health care. While those on Medicaid and Medicare are covered, the payments going to hospitals aren’t covering the cost of caring for a patient, which puts strain on rural hospitals. Many rural hospitals and clinics have also lost federal COVID-19 funding that was provided to prop them up during the pandemic.
The closure of medical services and hospitals adds a burden to already underserved communities.
“Headlines about rural hospitals closing an obstetrical unit will grab everyone’s attention because everyone is going to have empathy for a baby or a mother who might be struggling or at risk. But rural health care has so many other services that get overlooked. Think about pain management. An hour car ride to the closest hospital offering pain management services for someone who is experiencing back pain can be excruciating,” Gauderman said. “When someone is in crisis and they’re driving to the hospital and they see that blue sign with an “H” on it, it offers a little bit of relief. When specialized care units or hospitals close in rural areas, it removes that sense of relief.”
Not only do the closures of hospitals and medical services impact members of rural communities, it impacts practitioners in rural communities.
“For a lot of these professionals, when they go to nurse anesthesia school, usually it is with the goal of returning to their home community or a community they’re connected to, and that’s why they end up in these rural towns,” Gauderman said. “And so another big piece of that is these are usually people who love doing everything that they’ve been educated to do for their patients, providing the absolute best service they can. And from a job satisfaction standpoint, being able to do all of the different facets of anesthesia is a big part of that. So to lose an obstetrical department, they have to think about whether or not that is where they still want to be. Do they want to give up that skill set? And I think that’s the first place that my heart goes.”
Where Saint Mary’s steps in
Within the Saint Mary’s Doctor of Nursing Practice in Nurse Anesthesia program, Gauderman and the program faculty are focused on doing what they can to help alleviate the crisis in rural health care.
One major step the program has taken is focusing on accepting students from across the state, not just inside the Twin Cities metro.
“We have to be very mindful that we’re accepting students from these communities that are in need and need these providers, and also have a harder time recruiting people,” she said. Typically somebody is more likely to stay in these communities if it’s basically returning back home for them.”
The program also focuses on setting students in clinical settings in rural hospitals. With the program offering 40 clinical sites for its students, over a quarter of those clinical sites are in rural settings.
For Saint Mary’s nurse anesthetist students like Drentlaw and Tenzin Lobsang D’24, this is a major win.
While Lobsang did a majority of her rotations in the Twin Cities, she said her experience at Saint Croix Regional in Saint Croix Falls, Wis., was extremely eye-opening — so much so that she hopes to work one shift a week at the rural hospital.
“Going to St. Croix really opened up a new environment of practicing anesthesia for me as it was a CRNA-only practice. There we got to do a full scope of our practice, which included spinal anesthesia, epidurals, and doing regional nerve blocks for pain management during orthopedic surgeries,” she said. “During my clinical there I got to see all the things nurse anesthetists could do without the support of an anesthesiologist.”
With the need for competent, trained health care professionals in rural settings, both Drentlaw and Lobsang said they are pleased that Saint Mary’s has made rural health care a part of its focus.
“Saint Mary’s has been doing such a great job with rural hospitals,” Drentlaw said. “And these hospitals want to keep their partnerships with the university, so it just shows how well Saint Mary’s is training its students.”
Change starts with community
Ensuring all Minnesotans have a seat at the table
Dr. Stephanie Burrage C’95 has made it her mission to ensure everyone has both a seat and a voice at the table.
Within a year of her appointment as State of Minnesota’s Chief Equity Officer, Dr. Burrage had traveled to every region but one.
Her primary goal? To listen to those voices.
She says it’s the teacher in her who knows that “all people must be seen, heard, and valued right where they are in life.”
Prior to her current role, she served as deputy commissioner of the Minnesota Department of Education. After earning degrees in education, she was also a teacher in Minneapolis, and later went on to be superintendent of rural, urban, and suburban school districts in Minnesota and Michigan.
Education is where her heart lies. By 16, she knew she wanted to teach, following in the footsteps of her parents, who were both educators. “I wanted to make a difference in students’ lives,” she said.
It was during her teaching career that she first learned about DEI (Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion) before it was even a term. And she saw firsthand areas that needed improvement — in all schools.
“I’m a rural girl. I’m from a rural community and had 35 students in my graduating class, she said. “We assume that what happens in city areas does not happen in rural areas but community needs exist no matter where you live,” she said. “There are needs in all areas, rural, suburban, and big cities. We all must make sure we are meeting the needs of all of our students and community members.”
Dr. Burrage said she often uses an example from her early teaching years in Minneapolis. “I had never taught anyone from Hmong or Laos communities,” she said. “It was back in the ’90s as families were first immigrating to the area. My students taught me as much as I tried to teach them. I would tell them, ‘You’ve got to tell me what things I need to add to better meet your needs so you can see yourself in this curriculum.’ Just because DEI wasn’t a terminology yet, doesn’t mean it wasn’t my job to create that space for them.”
While serving on the Minnesota Department of Education, she led an initiative called “Mind, Body, and Soul,” a monthly virtual meeting of up to 125 community members, with a reach of more than 1,200 Minnesotans, to gather input on how to improve outcomes for people across the state.
“We started with the Black/African American community and are working toward ensuring we meet the needs of the accessibility community and have piloted Latino groups as well,” she said. “The input from the Mind, Body, and Soul convenings have provided insight on how to improve outcomes for community members.
By having Governor Walz, Lt. Governor Flanagan, commissioners, and state leaders in the room with community members, we can get valuable feedback to ensure systems level change on topics that are relevant to communities.
“I believed that bringing about positive change had to start with community, so the voices of community members were heard and honored. These conversations and convenings allowed the Office of Equity, Opportunity, and Accessibility to provide one pathway of many to state government.”
Recurring themes, she said, revolve around available housing, strong education, access to jobs, and healthcare.
“Any day I get to talk with people is a good day,” she said. “I love to hear from people about what they would like to see and their hopes and dreams for their families and how the state serves them.”
Dr. Burrage describes her role as building connections, working with the governor and lieutenant governor, the cabinet, the community, and various state agencies about topics like accessibility, procurement, and grants. Many of the ideas that came out of those community meetings are then prioritized for Gov. Tim Walz’s budget.
Additionally, they host events like the State of Minnesota Career Fair which showcased 635 jobs across the state during Martin Luther King weekend; 1,200 people registered and between 1,500 and 1,600 people attended. “That was a goal that we set,” she said. “How do we make sure we engage with community members in areas of need that they shared with us?”
Another example in spring was the State Procurement Opportunity Fair, in which attendees could meet with buyers from more than 20 state agencies to see how their businesses may fit into procurement and contracting needs.
“Change can happen,” she said. “It’s going to come back to voice. I believe one voice can always help to make change. And, when you get multiple voices aligned, how powerful are we as a world when we can all work together? That doesn’t mean we all share the same opinion. We have to learn how to have respect and honor differing opinions and value one another. We have to ask ourselves, ‘What is the overall good and how do we get past our differences?’ ”
Unleashing a better life
Can Do Canines places 900 dogs
At age 35, Alan Peters B’74 thought to himself … there has to be more in life.
The psychology and human development major, who once planned to become a counselor, no longer felt fulfilled with selling insurance and flipping houses.
“I wanted something more out of life,” he said. “I wanted to do something to help people.”
When his fiancee (now wife) came home with a brochure about training dogs for people who are deaf, a spark ignited.
“We did some market research in Minnesota and found out there were a lot of people who were deaf and could use that service, but No. 1, there were very few dogs being trained, and No. 2, the people who were deaf didn’t have the additional income to be able to purchase a dog like that. It costs thousands of dollars to train a dog,” he said.
“That almost sounded like a dead end, but I learned about the nonprofit world,” he added. “I learned I could raise money to provide them free of charge.”
So, in 1987, from a spare bedroom in his home, with no official training in the nonprofit world or fundraising, very little money, and a staff of primarily one, he founded what grew into Can Do Canines in New Hope, Minn.
By 1989, the first team — dog and client — was placed, Annie and Marcy.
And since then, 900 dogs have been partnered, with another 45 or more being trained for placement this year, all at no cost to their clients. The staff has grown to 50 (with hundreds of volunteers), and the business — an industry leader — is now run from a 25,000-square-foot training facility.
Although he has hundreds of stories of how Can Do Canines has made people’s lives more independent, there’s one sad story in particular that continues to weigh on Peters.
Early in this career, a hearing dog named Suzy was placed with a woman named Carol in Minneapolis. “Back then I was doing almost everything,” he said, explaining that he would get to know both the dogs and their partners well. “I would pick the dog, find the trainer, work with the trainer. And then I’d video them working together as a test to make sure the dog is working perfectly for tests like a smoke alarm or when someone rings a doorbell,” he said. “When it was completed, she said to me, ‘Al, I have one other thing; could you train little Suzy to alert me when my blood sugar is going to go low? Sometimes it goes low very suddenly and I’m afraid one day I’m going to die in my sleep.’
“This was long before we started training dogs for those with diabetes,” he explained. “Right then it sounded like a pipe dream. We didn’t know how yet to train a dog like that. I told her I’d think about it but I didn’t think we could help.”
A year and a half later Peters learned that Carol had died while asleep in her bed with Suzy beside her. “I felt terrible,” he said, his voice cracking. “And it took that push for me to investigate how dogs could help with that disability.”
Through the years, Can Do Canines has trained dogs to not only help those with hearing loss and Type 1 Diabetes complicated by hypoglycemia unawareness, but also children with autism and individuals with seizures and mobility challenges.
And he’s heard several stories about how the service dogs have helped save many other lives.
“They keep kids with autism safe,” he said. “Children with autism often bolt away from their mom or dad. By the time they are 7 or 8, they can be faster than their parents and they can run out into the street or are often attracted to water. The dogs are tethered to the children, between a waist belt on the child and a backpack on the dog. As soon as it gets tugged on, the dog lays down and won’t let them run.”
Peters adds that dogs have an overall tendency to make life better just by being near.
“I’ve always been a dog lover,” he said. “Some people do better with their disabilities when they feel better about themselves. Dogs lift spirits and help them look at the positive side of life or with what they are living with.”
Another group of individuals who have been helped through Can Do Canines are inmates who are assisting with training.
“We currently have 275 dogs and puppies in process in order to place about 45 dogs this year. It takes 600 volunteers, and we have 170 inmates in eight prisons, federal and state, who are raising and training dogs in Wisconsin and Minnesota,” he said. “The dogs benefit greatly by having someone fully dedicated to them. The inmates really do not have a lot in their lives so the dog becomes a primary focus. It gets all their attention, so they do a great job for us in terms of training.”
Where the inmates cannot train — in the socialization areas like car rides and shopping malls — other volunteers step in.
As their dogs must be able to live long and healthy lives with no additional cost to their owners, most of their dogs are bred, but others come from shelters, creating yet another life-saving partnership.
Peters continued to serve as executive director of Can Do Canines until his retirement in 2021. Even now, he continues to take one of the trained service dogs to nursing homes to lift residents’ spirits.
“The bigger we got, I was dealing more with money and staff and the board of directors and less and less with the clients,” he said. “My favorite time of year was when we would have graduation events with 15 of these teams; that’s when I would feel really good and would get to ask them how their lives have changed and how they feel about their dogs. Knowing we’ve helped so many feels good.”
Daniel publishes research article in AANA Journal
Dr. Carol Daniel M’04, academic director and associate professor of Saint Mary’s doctorate of nursing practice nurse anesthesiology program, recently published a research article in the American Association of Nurse Anesthesiology (AANA) Journal, stemming from a project she began while pursuing her doctorate degree at Missouri State University.
The article highlights the changing ways we provide anesthesia and ways to make it safer with various airway techniques. Daniel hoped to address a common problem in same-day surgery and airway management: the devices had not been changed or adapted for 100 years. A fellow certified registered nurse anesthetist (CRNA) – and Saint Mary’s alum – Dr. Roxanne McMurray ’93 designed a new airway device (MEA, McMurray Medical mcmurraymed.com) that offers a new solution to a long term problem.
“I wanted to test this airway device and see if it would alleviate a potential airway issue in same-day surgery,” said Daniel. “It was exciting to be involved and test this groundbreaking invention.”
Daniel has been teaching in Saint Mary’s nurse anesthesiology program since 2014. In addition to the classroom, she is also a clinical coordinator training student nurse anesthetists – including many from Saint Mary’s – in a clinical setting at Saint Cloud Surgical Center. She has a passion for educating future CRNAs, incorporating various teaching methodologies, and keeping up with the learning needs of the next generation.
“I love my profession and aim to share my knowledge as well as facilitate education to create the best CRNAs for our future,” Daniel shared. “I want these future CRNAs to know that they CAN and WILL succeed. It is such an exciting time in education, as there are many ways to immerse the students into anesthesia education creatively. Saint Mary’s allows me to create these educational experiences and convey this message.”
Partnership shows global impact of education
Through a partnership with the American Creativity Academy, Saint Mary’s is offering graduate education for teachers in Kuwait.
The American Creativity Academy is the largest private school in Kuwait educating over 6,000 girls and boys in PreK-12 on multiple campuses. For more than 20 years, the American Creativity Academy has offered values-based education with an American curriculum. “Our mission is to be the premier American school in the region,” said Dr. Claire Shea, head of the School for the American Creativity Academy and Saint Mary’s faculty, “and our partnership with Saint Mary’s ensures that our teachers are prepared to offer excellent classroom instruction as well as to become educational leaders.”
Sama Educational Company operates the campuses of American Creativity Academy (ACA) in Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, and Oman. Dahi Al Fadhli, chief executive officer of Sama Educational Company, has consistently supported the partnership with Saint Mary’s as a Catholic university because of his belief in faith-based education, and recently received an honorary Doctorate of Educational Leadership degree during Saint Mary’s commencement ceremony June 1 in Minneapolis. Al Fadhli has served as deputy secretary general of Kuwait’s Ministry of Islamic Affairs, as well as an economic researcher for the Kuwait Central Bank and director of development and planning for the Shuaiba Industrial Company.
More than 120 teachers are enrolled in the M.A. in Education and Ed.S. in Educational Administration programs through Saint Mary’s. This partnership is expanding to include a cohort of teachers in Saint Mary’s Executive Ed.D. program.
FEATURED VIDEO
Dahi Al Fadhli sits down with Saint Mary’s communications specialist, Ben Rodgers, to discuss the importance of a high quality education and its impact on society across the globe.
Building bridges
Eliminating barriers to mental health services
Ali Aden M’20, C’20 says you don’t go into counseling for the money.
“If you are there for the money, you’re in the wrong field. We’re in it to help people,” he said.
It was this desire to help people that brought him to Saint Mary’s.
Aden had been working in the human service field in case management and employment counseling. As clients were coming in with depression and other mental health issues, he knew he didn’t have the skills to address those issues, so he decided to pursue a master’s degree in Counseling and Psychology from Saint Mary’s. It helped that his wife, Lul Nur M’11, was already a graduate of the program and a licensed therapist.
It was their continued desire to help people that led them to move from the Twin Cities to St. Cloud and open Bridge Healing Center, a culturally specific mental health service, in June 2022.
The couple, both from Somalia (with Nur raised in Egypt before coming to the U.S.), saw many East Africans traveling all the way from St. Cloud to the Twin Cities to obtain mental health services. Although a large Somali population lives in St. Cloud, Aden says there was nothing available for them.
In Bridge’s relatively short history, it has grown from a staff of two to six full-time staff members and another four contracted therapists. Although they see primarily East Africans and Africans, Aden said they serve other diverse populations.
“We see an increased need for mental health services across the board, across financial statuses, race. Those migrating from other countries are no exception,” he said. “It’s important to meet people where they are and have a culturally appropriate understanding and the staff who can relate to them and in whom they can see themselves.
That opens a lot of doors.” Aden said more mental health providers of color, particularly men, are desperately needed in Minnesota. It is also beneficial when they can speak multiple languages.
“We have staff who speak multiple languages: Somali, English, and Arabic,” he said. “That’s important. That eliminates the barrier of trusting another person, the interpreter, and it creates a stronger relationship with your provider because you connect with them. You don’t have to explain where you came from, your customs.”
He said one barrier often begins with navigating how to find the services needed, particularly if English isn’t your primary Language.
In addition to mental health services, they’ve also added addiction treatment services.
“Kudos to Saint Mary’s,” he said. “I was doing mental health counseling and they told me I could add on (a certificate) in addiction studies, and I jumped in and didn’t look back. It saved me time and money. I had a really good experience that had a lot of impact on me and my career,” he said. “The field is changing. They used to look at mental health and addiction studies as two different things.
Now the feeling is that they go hand in hand; you can’t treat one without the other. Most of our staff are mental health therapists who also have licenses in addiction. We are able to treat both and also in a cultural lens.”
Aden explains that right now, they have the ability to house six East African men battling addiction, but it is their goal to expand and eventually offer lodging for women with addictions as well.
“You could be coming from a war-torn country, using substances to cope with the trauma you have had in the past,” he said. “They need resources. We saw that need. That’s why we went into the field, to help folks. We hope to make a longstanding impact by being an organization that’s living its mission and vision, providing help to everyone who needs the help in an ethically appropriate way.”
The hours are long and the need is great. Aden explains that with addiction services, he and his team spend about six hours a day, four days a week, with their clients. “You get to know them,” he said. “And you see the change from the day they come in to the day they graduate, physically and mentally. You see their healing from past trauma. You are so involved and engaged, no two days are the same, and there are always challenges and the need is tremendous, but to see them leave the program in a much healthier space than when they came in is worth it.
The Rev. James P. Burns, IVD, Ph.D.
President
Saint Mary's University of Minnesota
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