CSB, others mourn loss of Sister O’Connell

by Dennis Dalman

editor@thenewsleaders.com

Sadness fell Saturday at the College of St. Benedict and elsewhere when it was learned Sister Colman O’Connell has died at the age of 90 peacefully but unexpectedly at St. Benedict Monastery.

Colman was the 11th president of CSB; she served two five-year terms from 1986 to 1996. She succeeded the presidency of her dear friend and CSB classmate S. Emmanuel Renner, the 10th president of the university.

Current CSB President Mary Dana Hinton praised O’Connell on the CSB website:

“S. Colman leaves a legacy of compassion, of strength and of course,” she wrote, “we will miss her greatly.”

A prayer vigil will be held for O’Connell at 7 p.m. Friday, Oct. 6 in Sacred Heart Chapel at the St. Benedict’s Monastery in St. Joseph. On Saturday, Oct. 7 her funeral Eucharist will take place at 10 a.m., also in Sacred Heart Chapel. Burial will follow in the St. Benedict’s Monastery Cemetery.

Memorial gifts can be made to scholarships at the College of St. Benedict in honor of S. Colman O’Connell or to the Sisters of St. Benedict Retirement Fund.

From S. Colman’s first appearance on the CSB campus in the 1940s, she was a natural and determined leader, Hinton emphasized.

“For more than seven decades, she did, indeed lead,” Hinton stated. “Whether as a student body president, a tenured faculty member and chair in the Theater Department, college president or as an extraordinary fundraising professional, S. Colman led with passion, with intellect and with heart.”

O’Connell hailed from Roberts, Wis. As a “Bennie,” she was elected class president in her first year. She graduated from CSB in 1950 with degrees in English and speech. She then began teaching, first at Pierz Memorial High School and later at St. Cloud Cathedral High School.

In 1954, she earned a master’s degree in English and in theater from the Catholic University of America. She then returned to CSB, where she began to teach in the Theater and Dance Department, serving as the department’s chair from 1954-1974. That was a time of increasing bonds between CSB and St. John’s University, which formed a joint Theater Department in the 1960s. O’Connell served on the building committee of the Benedicta Arts Center, and in 1962 ground was broken for the center.

From 1977 to 1979, O’Connell studied at Michigan State University, earning her master’s, then returning to CSB, becoming director of planning and then vice president before her 1986 selection as president.

During O’Connell’s years as CSB president, the bonds between CSB and SJU grew ever stronger, with a joint core curriculum and joint academic departments.

Many new majors and minors were added, and joint administrative developments were begun.

Construction on campus also boomed during those years: Margretta Hall, renovation of Main Building, the Ardolf Science Center, Lottie Hall, Brian Hall and the Haehn Campus Center.

Upon her retirement in 1996, O’Connell was asked what she would like people to be saying 20 years hence. And this is what she said:

“I hope that 20 years from now people will say the (two) colleges made a bold (move) in creating the coordinate relationship to promote the education of men and women. Education for men and for women in this coordinate, gender-conscious environment is the best way to educate students. It is not only superior to co-education, but also to single-sex education. Some have mistakenly assumed we’ve created the coordinate relationship because it is so difficult to attract students to traditional women’s colleges or men’s colleges. However, in addition to not being salable, I don’t believe that single-sex education for either men or women is as effective as that of the model created at CSB and SJU. I’m persuaded we have the potential to serve women better and men better than that provided at either single-sex or at co-ed schools.”

In her retirement years, her service to the colleges continued unabated. She agreed to serve as vice president of Institutional Advancement and led CSB fundraising efforts. In 2005, she became senior development officer for Institutional Advancement and continued to serve in that capacity until her death.