Applications are now open for nursing scholarships awarded by the Ascension St. John Foundation. 

These scholarships, which range from $1,000 -$5,000, are available to qualified associates and community nursing students to help further their education through an accredited training program.

Click here for additional information, eligibility requirements and to submit an online application by April 30.

Recipients will be notified by May 31 and will be recognized at a special reception later this year.

Questions? Please email stjohnfoundation@ascension.org.

Nursing Scholarships funded by the St. John Foundation

The Ascension St. John Foundation has helped provide support to our associates in times of hardship through its Associate Hardship Program. Through its generous donors, the foundation has been able to provide more than $70,000 annually in emergency assistance to associates experiencing various types of financial need. 

The fund was established in 2020 during the COVID-19 pandemic to support employees facing unexpected or difficult personal circumstances. It provides timely assistance to individuals who encounter challenges such as natural disasters, housing crises or other unforeseen events that disrupt their lives or financial stability.

Every dollar donated to this fund benefits our local associates. A committee of local leaders at Ascension St. John Medical Center meets monthly to personally review each funding request from associates throughout Tulsa, Bartlesville, Broken Arrow, Sapulpa, Nowata, Owasso, Jenks and all AMG clinic sites.   

Donate to the Associate Hardship Program at Ascension St. John today!

St. John Associate Hardship Program

Sister M. Therese Gottschalk, SSM, 1931-2020

Sister M. Therese Gottschalk, SSM, passed away Monday, Feb. 24, 2020, in Oshkosh, Wisconsin. She was 88 years old. “We are beyond grateful for her 38 years of leadership with Ascension St. John in Oklahoma and the Sisters of the Sorrowful Mother,” said Joseph R. Impicciche, JD, MHA, President and Chief Executive Officer, Ascension. A remembrance service and Catholic Mass celebrating her life was held in Oshkosh, WI on March 4, 2020. Sister M. Therese Gottschalk was born in 1931 in Bavaria, Germany, the second of 14 children. She entered the Congregation of the Sisters of the Sorrowful Mother at the age of 21. She moved to Milwaukee in 1953 and earned a pharmacy degree from Creighton University in Omaha, Nebraska, in 1960. After graduation, she operated the pharmacy for a new 150-bed hospital in Roswell, New Mexico, for eight years. Sr. Therese left this position to obtain a master’s degree in hospital administration from Saint Louis University. Known for both her commitment to the Mission of Catholic healthcare and her business acumen, Sr. Therese became an assistant administrator of St. John’s Hospital in Tulsa (later St. John Medical Center) and its School of Nursing in 1970, serving in this role for two years. As part of her duties, she worked with other assistant administrators to operate the hospital and to design a new hospital tower. Sr. Therese returned to Roswell for two years to serve as hospital administrator, then returned to Tulsa after being named St. John’s Hospital President in 1974. 

Upon her return, the hospital underwent a $40 million construction project to build the North Tower, now called the J.A. Chapman Tower. The 603-bed tower was dedicated Feb. 22, 1976. Sr. Therese became Chief Executive Officer of St. John Health System in 1982 and served through 2010. Sr. Therese was always at the forefront of expanding services to meet the growing needs of the community, especially those living in poverty and most vulnerable. During her career, Sr. Therese supervised the building of the Mary K. Chapman Health Plaza, the Bernsen, Kravis, Holliman and Wheeling buildings, and purchase of the Robert W. Davis Tower in Tulsa. Also during her tenure, St. John Health System expanded to include St. John Sapulpa, Jane Phillips Medical Center, St. John Broken Arrow and St. John Owasso. St. John also opened clinics in Sand Springs, Sapulpa and Broken Arrow, Oklahoma, and helped create OMNI Medical Group, a primary care physician group now part of Ascension Medical Group St. John. During her tenure, Regional Medical Laboratory was also established. 

Thanks in large part to Sr. Therese’s vision, Marian Health System was founded in 1989, loosely combining the healthcare activities of the three Sisters of the Sorrowful Mother provinces: Wisconsin, New Jersey and Oklahoma/Kansas. Sr. Therese served as President and Chief Executive Officer of the Marian Health System, from that time until it joined Ascension on April 1, 2013. Sr. Therese then served as Senior Executive Advisor to the President and Chief Executive Officer of Ascension Health and Executive Vice President of Ascension. She also continued to serve on the boards of the former regional systems of Marian Health System: Ministry Health Care, St. John Health System and Via Christi Health. She also served as an inaugural member of the Ascension Wisconsin Board of Directors until June 2019. Through the course of her faith-filled life of service, Sr. Therese achieved many honors and recognitions. She was a Fellow in the American College of Healthcare Executives and was recognized with its Regent Award in 1995. She served as President of the Tulsa Hospital Council from 1982-1983, the American Hospital Association Governance Committee, and served on the boards of the Catholic Health Association and the Oklahoma Hospital Association (OHA). In 1984, she served as the Oklahoma Hospital Association Board of Trustees Chair. She received the OHA W. Cleveland Rodgers Distinguished Service Award in 1999, was awarded the Association for Women in Communication 2009 Newsmaker Award, was awarded the Award of Merit in 2010 from OHA and held an honorary doctorate of humane letters from the University of Oklahoma. She was inducted into the Tulsa Historical Society’s Hall of Fame in 2011. On Sept. 25, 2019, Sr. Therese left Oklahoma and Ascension St. John to retire in Oshkosh. 

The City of Tulsa Mayor, G.T. Bynum, proclaimed this day Sister M. Therese Gottschalk Day for her remarkable service resulting in the legacy of compassionate healthcare for the City of Tulsa, especially for those who are sick and vulnerable. “May God grant to Sr. Therese eternal rest.  Our prayers are with her and her loved ones,” Impicciche said.

Remembering Sister M. Therese Gottschalk, SSM

St. John’s Hospital (renamed Ascension St. John Medical Center) officially opened on February 22, 1926, but its story began nine years before, in 1917. 

The Sisters of the Sorrowful Mother (SSM), looking to establish a new medical ministry as they had in Wisconsin, Kansas, and New Jersey, purchased an 8 ¾ acre farm at the dusty corner of 21st Street and Utica Avenue in Tulsa, Oklahoma. Groundbreaking for the hospital did not take place until 1920, and as finances languished, the uncompleted hospital stood empty for three years until renewed interest by members of the Catholic Church and city officials finished the facility.

Hundreds of Tulsans donated funds in 1925 to complete the original St. John building, which opened the following year. So great was the need for a true stand-alone hospital (throughout its brief history, Tulsa’s early medical facilities tended to be converted houses) that patients flooded St. John’s days before the hospital was officially opened – the first birth occurred there more than a week before the opening, on Valentine’s Day. Ever since, this community has supported St. John Health System, and St. John has worked to return the favor by providing the best care to our patients and their families.

In the beginning, the Sisters of SSM were evident in every aspect of St. John’s operations – administration and kitchen duty, dispensers of medications from the pharmacy, and as tillers of the soil (where an eight-story parking garage now stands, the Sisters once had a good-size garden). Opening the same year as the hospital was St. John’s School of Nursing. Before it closed in 1976, the school graduated more than 1,400 nurses, including many of the Sisters who chose that profession as their mission.  

St. John faced many of the same problems as other medical facilities, including the polio epidemic – by 1949, the hospital had 10 operational iron lungs – but its biggest challenge was often space. In 1948, a new hospital wing added 125 new beds; by the mid-1950s, another wing added another 202 beds to serve the rapidly growing community. 

By then, St. John was becoming known as a city- and state-wide leader in healthcare. Tulsa’s first heart valve repair occurred there in 1955, followed by the city’s first successful pacemaker installation (1963), first coronary bypass (1969), Oklahoma’s first linear accelerator for cancer treatment, and Tulsa’s first neonatal intensive care unit (1971). That leadership continues today, with the state’s first da Vinci robotic surgical system used for prostate surgery (2005), the first hospital in eastern Oklahoma to receive Magnet® designation for nursing excellence (2010; re-designated in 2015), and, this year, a joint venture between St. John Health System and the Tulsa Cancer Institute – the Oklahoma Cancer Specialists and Research Institute – providing comprehensive oncology services to the region.

Today, Ascension St. John Health System presents medical excellence through six hospitals, and Ascension St. John Medical Group, a network of primary care physicians and specialists. And the health system serves those most in need, investing more than $10 million annually in the Medical Access Program and Community Health Equity Catalyst Strategy, serving Tulsa’s uninsured and underinsured populace; and presenting more than $9.5 million each year in community benefit.  

Marking St. John’s 100th Anniversary

Ascension  St. John awarded more than $15M in health equity-focused grants at their inaugural Legacy of Love Luncheon held Friday, February, 14, 2025.  This event brought together community leaders, health equity partners and representatives from each of this year’s 40 grant-receiving organizations to celebrate the catalytic and community-focused activity supported by St. John’s Health Equity Initiative. 

“St. John has been here to care for Tulsa and the surrounding communities for almost 100 years. This care extends far beyond the halls and walls of our hospitals and clinics. Through the work of our health equity team, we are able to extend our Christ-centered mission to improve the health of our neighbors in need and in the communities we call home. I’m proud that we can play a small part in making today and tomorrow better and brighter for our fellow Tulsans,” said Bo Beaudry, CEO of Ascension St. John. 

These grants are for direct operational and programmatic support, not for event related sponsorships or other marketing-related activities. A flagship program of the health equity institute is St. John’s Medical Access Program which provides operational, programmatic and underwriting support for area safety net clinics.

"For almost a century, Ascension St. John has been a pillar of care and compassion in Tulsa, and their Health Equity Initiative and this year’s investment of more than $15 million in local organizations is truly transformative for our community," Tulsa Mayor Monroe Nichols said. "Advancing healthcare access, uplifting underserved communities, and strengthening the well-being of our city will continue to impact the physical and mental health outcomes for Tulsa's children and families. Investments like this are essential in ensuring that healthcare is accessible, equitable, and tailored to the needs of our community, and we are grateful for Ascension St. John's continued commitment to Tulsa."

The 2025 Health Equity Grantees include the following: 

Health Outreach Prevention Education, Inc.

Alzheimer's Diversity outreach Services, Inc.

City of Tulsa on behalf of the Tulsa Fire Department

Ascension St. John Foundation provides $15 million in grants to support community health equity

On November 23, 2022, the American Council on Gift Annuities (ACGA) announced that it would be increasing its suggested maximum annuity rates, effective January 1, 2023. The new rates replace the rates that became effective July 1, 2022. The ACGA’s decision to increase its suggested maximum gift annuity rates was triggered by the sharp rise in interest rates that started in March 2022 and has continued since July 2022. 

For most gift annuities, the new rates are 0.6% - 0.7% higher than the rates they replace. If you defer the start of payments for a year or more, the increase is even greater.

Ordinarily, you would expect a higher annuity rate to result in a lower charitable deduction. However, the new deductions available in January 2023 will be about the same as they were in July 2022, despite the higher ACGA rates. This is because in the second half of 2022 there has been a spike in the interest rate used to compute gift annuity deductions. The recent spike in this interest rate does have a negative effect; it has reduced the tax-free portion of annuity payments.

The combination of higher annuity rates and substantial deductions makes gift annuities even more attractive to donors seeking to make a gift and receive fixed payments for life.

Higher Annuity Rates as of January 1, 2023