HistoryGustavus Nursing History

History
Gustavus Adolphus College is private liberal arts college grounded in Swedish and Lutheran heritages. The college is affiliated with the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America. The college is guided by five core values: community, excellence, faith, justice, and service. Gustavus Adolphus College has offered the baccalaureate nursing program since 1956. 

In the early nursing program at Gustavus, nursing students spent their first two years at Gustavus on campus and their last two years in residency at Bethesda Lutheran hospital in St. Paul. By 1986, enrollment in nursing programs across the country had declined. While several programs closed, St. Catherine University (previously known as the College of St. Catherine), Gustavus Adolphus College, and St. Olaf College combined their nursing programs to create the Minnesota Intercollegiate Nursing Consortium (MINC). The MINC office was housed at the College of St. Catherine and nursing students from all three colleges took all of their nursing classes on the campus of the College of St. Catherine. 

In 1991, the College of St. Catherine withdrew from the MINC in order to expand their own program. The MINC office was moved to St. Olaf College and students from Gustavus and St. Olaf returned to their own respective colleges for classes. This was the first time in the history of the Gustavus nursing program that nursing students lived on campus all four years. 

Due to growing enrollment and institutional differences, the MINC Administrative Board voted to dissolve the MINC in April, 2014. The Board of Trustees of Gustavus Adolphus College gave formal approval to the establishment of the Gustavus Nursing program in April 2014. 

The Gustavus Nursing program provides an innovative, strong curriculum based on professional standards, promotes the role of nursing in a dynamic, inter-professional health care envi­ronment, and attracts diverse, well-qualified students capable of attaining expected student learning outcomes.

The Minnesota Board of Nursing granted continuous approval for the Gustavus Nursing program in June 2014.