After considering options in Oak Park, LaGrange Park, and Park Ridge, Resurrection Health Care has settled on St. Elizabeth Hospital in Chicago as the future destination for Resurrection University, the nursing school currently located at the corner of Erie and Austin, next to West Suburban Medical Center in Oak Park.
Scott Dunnell, director of communications and alumni relations for the school, said there are still a number of steps to be taken before the decision is finalized, but it is the intent of Resurrection Health Care and the university to make the move to the city.
“We are in the final stages of getting approval for that,” Dunnell said. Both boards of trustees for Resurrection Health Care and Resurrection University will have to officially sign off, as will the city of Chicago. But Dunnell said the move has already been made public.
“Students, faculty, and the university community at large [are] aware of the fact that we are planning on moving to St Elizabeth,” he said.
But Oak Park Development Corporation President Sarah Faust, an organization that has assisted Resurrection in exploring options for relocating the university in Oak Park, said she hopes they change their mind.
“We are hopeful that we can keep a nearly 100-year-old Oak Park institution in our community,” Faust said. “We have met with Resurrection University and members of the health care organization and have shown them potential sites — shovel-ready sites as well as existing structures that may be able to accommodate their short-term and long-term needs here in the community.”
But it was those needs that eventually pointed Resurrection to St. Elizabeth, according to Dunnell.
“St. Elizabeth is going to be a more centralized location [and] we will be in a hospital,” Dunnell said. “In their estimation, that will also improve the opportunities for students in terms of clinical experience.”
Dunnell said the university first began discussing a move in the spring of 2010, to meet Resurrection Health Care’s vision of the growing needs for health care education. The move, they believe, will allow them to fulfill all of their educational needs at one centralized location.
But Faust said she believes Oak Park can accommodate those needs. “We have great amenities, a vibrant community that would be attractive to their students, and we think that an educational institution in Oak Park is a good fit,” she said.
Faust said she showed Resurrection representatives potential sites around town, including on Madison and Lake streets.
“We knew that this was the likely outcome but certainly did not want to miss the opportunity to retain such an important anchor,” she said.
Dunnell said Resurrection is likely to have a final decision on St. Elizabeth by early September, if not sooner, and the intent is to be moved into the new location by the fall of 2012. He said they’re looking forward to the future of the university.
“We think that new facilities for Resurrection University will continue what we believe is a heritage of educational excellence that started over 100 years ago with West Suburban College of Nursing. What we’re excited about is that fact that we can go from this dear old campus in Oak Park to brand new facilities,” he said. “Assuming that they’re at St. Elizabeth, we’ll provide everything that students need to be able to really bring them to their career goals of professional health care education.”
But Faust said that until the decision is final, the folks at Oak Park Development Corporation will stay optimistic. “We’ll be hopeful,” she said. “We’ll continue to solicit their reconsideration until the ultimate decision and all of the necessary work is complete on their part.”