Dean Longenecker Brings a Pulse to UNC

Dean Beth Longenecker stands beside the vision of UNC’s new College of Osteopathic Medicine, a project she describes as “a heartbeat forming” on campus. PHOTO BY JAYLEN LEE 

Dust swirls around the construction site where steel beams rise across the Colorado horizon. To most, it looks like just another building going up at the University of Northern Colorado. But to Founding Dean Beth Longenecker, it's something far more personal. It’s a heartbeat forming and a new method of care being planted, and Dean Longenecker has been leading UNC’s College of Osteopathic Medicine from blueprint to reality. 

As a doctor, educator and lifelong believer in the power of community, Longenecker has spent her career helping people grow, whether its students finding their footing in medicine or patients finding their way back to health. Before arriving in Greeley, she served as dean of the Ohio University Heritage College of Osteopathic Medicine’s Dublin campus, where she helped build programs that emphasized compassion as much as clinical skill. 

“I always would joke about being a genetic osteopathic doc because my dad was an osteopathic family med doctor in rural Pennsylvania,” Longenecker said. “I got to see firsthand what he could do for his community and take care of patients. I even remember going out on house calls and everything with him in the Jeep... I think that's what inspired me to become an osteopathic physician.” 

Those early memories of house calls and small-town medicine help explain why Longenecker accepted the founding dean job at UNC. The role lets her shape a new college from the ground up and brings an osteopathic focus to northern Colorado. It is an approach that links structure, function and community into a region that needs more doctors. 

“When you look at DO (doctor of osteopathy) medical schools, there are only eight that are open and accredited now in public universities. The rest are all private. And I really believe in that whole model of public education,” Longenecker said. “When you look at the university here, their student-first approach really resonates with me because that's the environment we want at a medical school. Medical school is already hard, but you don't want an environment that’s ‘Suck it up, Buttercup.’ You want one where it's like, ‘Yeah, it's hard. How can we help you succeed?'” 

How do you ensure an environment like that? Longenecker’s priorities are practical and plainly stated: hire people who want to mentor students, build formative assessments that help learners find weak spots without piling on work and being a stickler on grades and create a student success team to intervene when someone’s performance suddenly drops. 

“As we're interviewing people for the job, we want to hear that, ‘I'm here, I want to mentor students. I want to do this,’" Longenecker said. “We're going to have a student success committee. And their whole job is to look at students who are struggling in a subject or have a sudden change in their academic performance to reach out and say, ‘How do we find the resources you need to help you?'” 

That student-first mentality sits alongside a sharp community goal to train clinicians who will practice in northern Colorado and beyond. Longenecker described clinical placements that will span the Front Range and the state’s rural plains. These rotations can show students what practicing in small towns looks like. 

“We have agreements with the Eastern Plains Health Consortium, which is all the critical access and sole provider of hospitals from here out to Sterling, all the way down to Springfield. And that gives our students the opportunity to go out and spend a month or two in that environment and say, 'Maybe I want to be a rural doc in this town,'” Longenecker said. 

For Longenecker, those relationships are the foundation of UNC’s boldest move in decades. The new College of Osteopathic Medicine marks a turning point for a university long known for producing teachers and leaders.  

As President Andy Feinstein recalled, “We were founded as a teachers college over 135 to 136 years ago, and we did that because there was a demonstrated need for more teachers in Colorado. I think we've heard the call again with the demonstrated need for more healthcare professionals in Colorado and we're kind of leaning into that with this medical college.”  

That call and UNC’s willingness to answer it became the foundation for a project years in the making. Feinstein said he saw an opportunity to create something that reflected the university’s core values.  

“The premise of osteopathic medicine is of mind, body and spirit, where you focus on the whole body, the whole person,” Feinstein said. “That really exemplifies what we do at UNC, which is caring about people as human beings.” 

Longenecker carries that same philosophy forward. Her approach to medicine is rooted in connection. Between body and mind, between student and patient and between the university and its community. She often describes her role as helping UNC grow a program that’s not just medically excellent but deeply human. 

That humanity has inspired optimism across faculty and community partners alike. Dr. Jamie Hinojosa, chair of anatomy and one of the college’s founding leaders, said the excitement around the school goes beyond the university itself.  

“It’s filling a need,” Hinojosa said. “It’s putting physicians into rural areas, particularly here near northern Colorado, where people wouldn’t hopefully have to travel an hour and a half, two hours just to see a doctor.” 

Dr. Kamlesh Yadav, chair of biomedical sciences, echoed that sense of mission. “This is something that will impact generations,” Yadav said. “Students will come here, train here and stay here. It’s how you build a healthier Colorado.” 

Despite the massive scale of the project, both Longenecker and Feinstein see the medical school as an extension of UNC’s existing spirit. It’s about responding to what the state needs, just as the university did when it first began training teachers more than a century ago. 

Feinstein noted the milestones that brought the college to life.

"The first milestone was getting the laws changed to allow UNC to offer medical education. After that, figuring out how the university will pay for the school," Feinstein said. "With over $30 million from donors, including the largest gift in the university's history and help from the state donating $247 million to Colorado for medical education, our construction and the new building, that milestone was checked off."

For Longenecker, though, the real milestone will come when the first class of 75 students walks through the doors.

“We want students to come here to be able to experience the kind of community that the university provides,” Longenecker said. “That may be different from a medical college that’s kind of a standalone facility and doesn’t have athletics, student housing, performing arts and community like Greeley.” 

Longenecker is already imagining what success will look like years down the road. 

“When the first class graduates, I would love to see them all matched into the residencies they most want,” Longenecker said. “I want the community to realize that the medical school isn’t disruptive; it’s an asset. That we’ve opened our doors to the community, had our students and faculty volunteer and become part of Greeley.” 

That defines Longenecker's leadership: equal parts of heart and hope. It’s a sense of community that she believes will make UNC’s medical program thrive. As the final pieces of steel, brick and glass come together, the College of Osteopathic Medicine stands as both a symbol and a promise. It represents years of planning, millions in investments and the belief that healthcare can be both advanced and compassionate. 

For future students, the message is clear. As President Feinstein said, “UNC addresses the needs of our community… We tackle really big problems like addressing the healthcare shortages in our state.” 

As Dean Longenecker leads the way, the university that once trained Colorado’s teachers is preparing to educate its next generation of healers. One student, one patient, one heartbeat at a time.