Several college students in Minnesota have a unique living arrangement in the form of a partnership with a nearby assisted living home. The Watkins assisted living home has stood for years in contrast to Winona State University. Young and old separated by a few blocks and lots of decades.
But not anymore, because now six students at Winona State University have filled the empty rooms at Senior Living at Watkins, and are living in the same building as forty-five senior citizens, thanks to the director of assisted living at Winona Health, Cheryl Krage, who first considered the idea of placing students in eight empty rooms above the common areas of the Watkins mansion.
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As the students moved into Watkins at the start of the current school year, Krage encouraged them to share their gifts with their new neighbors.
On a recent weekday, nursing student Ashley McGaw held a bible study with 89-year-old Allen Thompson, who said:
“It’s a revelation, literally. It’s refreshing, it’s a breath of fresh air.”
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Not only are they living together in a historic mansion, but the senior citizens are also taking an active role in the lives of the students, asking if they’re doing well in school and eating well.
The students are helping the seniors, too, by volunteering. When they volunteer ten hours a month, they get a room for $400, and if they volunteer twenty hours, they only pay $200 a month for rent. Meals, utilities and Wi-Fi are included in the rent, according to Winona Health.
What a wonderful idea.
