What was once known as the College of Saint Teresa began as a seminary for young women in 1894. Run by the Rochester-based Sisters of Saint Francis, their program moved to Winona in 1894 and developed into a college by 1907, but it wasn't until five years later that it took a name honoring St. Teresa of Avila.
Patricia Thomas, who met Bellairs at Shimer College, explains why girls of her generation ended up at Catholic colleges. "Parents sent their daughters to Roman Catholic preparatory schools and colleges to keep them from having sex - that was the bottom line. Young women were expected to be educated just well enough to raise children and be good wives - or to become nuns." This setting, she feels, probably would later fuel Bellairs' decision to leave.
The college was very popular, drawing a large portion of its enrollment from the Chicago area. During the 1970's enrollment reached its peak, at about 1,100 students. Throughout the years the college's strongest area of study was nursing, having begun nursing instruction at the request of the prestigious Mayo Clinic in nearby Rochester. Its proximity allowed students to get first-hand experience in the medical field.
Pat Knee, who has been associated with the campus since 1963 and is now the Managing Director of the Hiawatha Education Foundation, also housed on the campus, cites financial problems during the 1970s that lead to the college's closing. "Nearby St. Mary's University, which had been a men's school overseen by the Christian Brothers, went co-ed around 1969 or 1970. True to its mission of the education of women, St. Teresa's continued operation as usual and enrollment gradually decreased." Competition for students was intense between the two colleges and later on St. Teresa's did admit some men on a commuting basis but the institutions did not collaborate on shared semester schedules or course work like other pairs of men/women Catholic colleges had done in the same era. The number of nuns teaching decreased during this time as did the number of young women at the convent and many fewer joined: parents no longer felt as obliged to send their children to a Catholic college.
During the late 70's, the Department of Nursing lost its accreditation for a year, and Knee says that things were never the same since. Not able to maintain the student body necessary, the College of Saint Teresa graduated its last class in 1989.
However the buildings on campus have assumed new tenants and owners over the years with St. Mary's University buying the campus in 2002. The CST Alumnae continue to maintain an office on campus.
