Mission accomplished: ‘Transformative’ Montana State nursing education building opens in Great Falls

GREAT FALLS - On a breezy October day at the Montana State University Mark and Robyn Jones College of Nursing campus in Great Falls, nursing students, faculty and their supporters gathered to celebrate a long-awaited transformation.

Nearly 300 attendees cheered as MSU President Brock Tessman, nursing dean Sarah Shannon, donor Mark Jones and other key advocates gave remarks and cut a ribbon in front of the new MSU nursing education building in Great Falls on Monday, Oct. 6.

The event marked the official grand opening of the building, the first of five new MSU nursing education buildings across the state to open. Nursing education buildings on MSU's other nursing campuses in Bozeman, Billings, Kalispell and Missoula are under construction and expected to open in 2026 and 2027. All together, the new facilities will help increase the number of Bobcat nurses that graduate each year by around 100 students. Currently, across the five campuses, MSU graduates around 300 bachelors-prepared nurses each year. Of those graduates, between 70 and 80% choose to stay in Montana.

The new infrastructure is part of a historic investment in MSU's College of Nursing made possible by a $101 million donation from Mark and Robyn Jones, founders of Goosehead Insurance, in 2021, which marked the single largest private gift in MSU's history. Benefis Health System also donated two acres of land to MSU to make the Great Falls building possible.

The two-story, approximately 17,000-square foot building features three large classrooms and a foundational skills room where students learn key tasks such as insertion of IVs and catheters. It also includes a simulation center with multiple rooms for the manikins students practice care on, a control room and a briefing room. The building also contains a slate of student-centered spaces, including private study rooms, study nooks, day use lockers, a break room and an outdoor terrace overlooking campus. Instruction began in the new building this fall.

"It is certainly a privilege to be here as we celebrate nothing less than a transformative moment in the history of our nursing college, the history of Montana State University and the history of Great Falls," said President Tessman at the event.

"I know that the impact of this building will go far beyond its walls. Nursing graduates who emerge from this building will care for your neighbors, your loved ones and you," Tessman said. "MSU nursing graduates will improve health care in our community and state. These healers will touch countless lives in deeply meaningful ways with their education, compassion and expertise."

Tessman thanked supporters of the building, including the contractor, Sletten Construction; the design firm, Cushing-Terrel; and MSU's Planning, Design and Construction team. He also commended the efforts of former MSU President Waded Cruzado, who secured donors and support for the project, and the land donation from Benefis. He announced the building's main entryway would be named Benefis Health System Nursing Gallery.

Monday's grand opening also featured remarks from Shannon, Jones, Great Falls nursing department head Susan Luparell, Benefis Health System CEO John Goodnow and Montana Rep. Troy Downing, whose daughter is a student in MSU's nursing program in Great Falls. Following remarks and a ribbon-cutting ceremony, attendees went on self-guided tours of the building.

Luparell said in recent years, the Great Falls nursing campus has graduated around 48 students annually. But the new facility will allow the program to increase its class size by some 50%, helping improve the shortfall of health care providers across the state.

"This building is literally alive with students," Luparell said, noting the previous instruction space was a basement in a Benefis Health building. "It has changed the way we teach, and it has changed the way students experience higher education. As we hoped, in this space that is specifically designed for teaching, learning and envisioning the nursing care of the future, the talents of our enthusiastic and creative faculty have been fully unleashed."

Many students attended the grand opening, as well. Brooklyn Presta, a senior nursing student from Kalispell, said the energy of the new building is lively and community-oriented, with the student-centered areas making her feel more supported.

Senior Makala Doherty, from Butte, said the new space enables a better education for students. Specifically, the simulation center is now far more realistic and less cramped than the old space, and she believes this improvement helps better prepare students for careers as nurses.

"It makes all the difference and just feels like better practice for real life," Doherty said.

Ashlyn Hofbauer, a senior from Oregon, added that she's thrilled she gets to experience the new building before graduating in December. Originally slated to open next spring, current seniors were unsure if they would get any time in the new building. But the happy surprise has made students even more excited and grateful to be receiving an education from MSU, Hofbauer said.

"It's just a huge privilege to be here. It's made learning so much easier," she said. "Especially being in our last semester, I feel like we're starting to get a little eager to graduate. But then just getting this awesome facility has made it a lot easier to be here and harder to leave."

Dean Shannon said the new building bolsters MSU's land-grant mission by educating nurses to support Montanans throughout the state.

"Our vision is to transform the lives and improve the health of Montana's communities, and we seek to do that through cutting-edge education, the creation of new knowledge and meaningful service," Shannon said. "This is the first of five buildings to be finished, and all I can say is: mission accomplished."

She added that it's fitting for the Great Falls building to be the first to open, as the campus' nursing program has a record of being first.

MSU's College of Nursing was founded in 1937 after the consolidation of nursing programs operated by three hospitals in Great Falls, Havre and Bozeman. The Great Falls campus was the first to offer upper-division nursing coursework, and over the decades the college has expanded to four other upper division locations across the state. MSU has also added a Master of Nursing degree and doctoral-level nursing programs with concentrations in family nurse practitioner, psychiatric mental health nurse practitioner, and, facilitated by the Jones' donation, a new nurse-midwifery option.

Mark Jones thanked the MSU nursing college and its students for their efforts and said seeing everything culminate at the event was making him tear up.

"This is a beautiful building, and I'm so thankful we had the chance to tour it, see all of these amazing resources and be involved in this way," Jones said. "I appreciate so much the opportunity we have to be connected with all of you because you are making a difference. You make a difference every single day, and you are making a difference with your lives. Thank you and good luck."