The Morningside College Nylen School of Nursing and the Morningside Student Nurses’ Association have named Chad Rasmussen of Rochester, Minn., as the 2016 nursing alumnus of the year.

The Morningside College Nylen School of Nursing and the Morningside Student Nurses’ Association have named Chad Rasmussen of Rochester, Minn., as the 2016 nursing alumnus of the year.

Rasmussen is a surgery instructor and an assistant professor of family medicine at the Mayo College of Medicine in Rochester. He also is a certified nurse practitioner with the Mayo Clinic Department of Family Medicine.

A native of Britt, Iowa, Rasmussen graduated with a Bachelor of Science in Nursing and a minor in biology from Morningside College in 1996. He received his Master of Science in Nursing from Creighton University in Omaha, Neb., as a nurse practitioner in family and emergency medicine.

Rasmussen will deliver the keynote speech for the opening of the 34th annual Maud Adams Nursing Research Day on April 13 at 8 a.m. in the Weikert Auditorium of Buhler Rohlfs Hall, 1701 Morningside Ave., on the Morningside campus.

During the opening remarks, the Nursing Alumni Scholarship will be presented in Rasmussen’s honor to Kourtney Mead, a senior who will graduate this spring from Carroll High School in Carroll, Iowa.  Mead plans to attend Morningside College in the fall. The scholarship is presented each year to a student who shows potential for outstanding professionalism in nursing.

Morningside senior nursing students will present their research projects from 2-3 p.m. April 13 in various locations on campus as part of Morningside’s Palmer Student Research Symposium.

The nursing research day started in 1983 as a tribute to the late Maud Adams, a former chair of the Morningside nursing department. Before she came to Morningside, Adams served as a staff nurse, instructor, and administrator in various public health agencies and nursing programs.