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Virginia
Campobello Simonetti , Nurs '58
 Virginia
Campobello Simonetti has always combined three of her great loves
in her work — nursing, people and Spanish. She currently
works as the communicable disease coordinator of the Mesa County
Health Department in Grand Junction, Colo., investigating all
reportable diseases. Virginia provides adult and child immunizations
and serves on the bio-terrorism preparedness team.
In
addition to extensive public health service, Virginia worked
20 years as evening shift charge nurse in the emergency department
for INOVA–Fairfax Hospital in Virginia and did lung cancer
research on uranium miners.
On a vacation in 2003, she
traveled to Honduras to join a medical brigade to give care
to the poor in that country. As the eldest of six children
and 42 grandchildren of Italian immigrants, she was the first
female from her family to graduate from college. She says attending
Marquette was a “supreme privilege,” and her experiences
at the university have had a great impact on her life’s
work and her desire to help others. “I loved my Jesuit
education and appreciate the richness and well-rounded experience
I had,” she says. “My faith was defined and strengthened
for life here at Marquette.”
Virginia is a role
model for her colleagues and serves as an example of how
to provide treatment for the poor, including migrants and refugees.
She is also a happy wife, mom and grandmother.
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