Maria Joseph Nursing and Rehabilitation Center has honored Sister Alice Schoettelkotte, a longtime employee and volunteer, with a scholarship program in her name.
Sister Alice (Rose Miriam) has served in various capacities at the Maria Joseph Center for 37 years. The Sister Alice Schoettelkotte Scholarship will provide grants to local high school students, as well as current employees of the Maria Joseph Center.
The scholarship is available to seniors at Trotwood-Madison and Northmont high schools who wish to pursue studies for State Tested Nurse Aide (STNA) certification. MJC employees who wish to gain further education in their field and advance professionally within the organization may also apply. Grants will cover both tuition and test fees.
“I’m just so pleased that they are doing this scholarship,” Sister Alice said. “We need good nursing assistants and other workers in our facility. This gives people in the area where we live an opportunity to get additional training, and the support this gives to the Maria Joseph Center is really important also.”
Sister Alice “embodies the compassionate, listening presence one would hope for in a caregiver,” said Sister Joyce Lehman, President of the Congregation. “We hope that the recipients of the scholarships will progress not only professionally, but also in their commitment and care for others, inspired by Sister Alice.”
MJC administrator Nick Anderson said he believes it is important to invest not only in the center’s facilities, but also its people — and that Sister Alice’s years of dedication made naming the scholarship program for her a “no-brainer.”
Originally from Cincinnati, Sister Alice came to Dayton to join the Sisters of the Precious Blood in 1954. After serving as an elementary counselor, junior high school music teacher and faith formation principal in the Cincinnati area, she returned to Dayton in 1980 to work at the Maria Joseph Center.
She served as admissions counselor and coordinator and director of spiritual care, maintaining the facility’s chapel, scheduling priests and ministers for Masses and interdenominational worship services, visiting residents, holding Bible studies and doing “whatever is needed for spiritual care,” she said.
Story by Mary Knapke
From left, Nick Anderson and Sisters Alice Schoettelkotte and Joyce Lehman in the chapel at the Maria Joseph Nursing and Rehabilitation Center; Michelle Bodine photo.