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A slice of Scott Curtis’ day looks more like the whole pie. On any given day, he’s meeting with medical staff and clinical leaders, planning for new health care facilities, and implementing new projects like electronic health records.

And he never gets tired of it.

Curtis, administrator of Kossuth Regional Health Center in Algona, Iowa, loves the dynamic field of health care because it touches Iowans in so many ways.

“Health care affects everyone in one way or another, and it’s energizing to work with folks to improve and provide quality health care,” he says.

A true Hawkeye, Curtis grew up in Mason City and earned an undergraduate degree in business and an MBA from the University of Iowa. He also earned a master’s degree in hospital and health administration, a program based in the Department of Health Management and Policy in the UI College of Public Health. U.S. News & World Report ranks the department among the top seven health care management programs in publicly supported universities.

Curtis says attending the UI accelerated his health care career and his skills because he was not only learning in the classroom but was also learning by doing. As part of his hospital and health administration courses, Curtis and his classmates were given the chance to work on real-world projects, such as providing several Iowa hospitals with recommendations on how to improve financial performance or inventory management.

“There’s nothing like the ability to see and work in an area you’re training for. The real setting is invaluable,” he says, adding that it was beneficial to experience team-oriented problem solving in a group dynamic.

After completing his graduate degrees, Curtis earned a fellowship in Mason City at St. Joseph Mercy Hospital, where he worked for eight years before landing his job at Kossuth Regional Health Center in 1999.

“My UI education was very pragmatic in that it reinforced the importance of establishing and maintaining relationships in the real world,” he says. “I continued my [hometown] connections with folks in Mason City, and those relationships helped me land a fellowship right out of my graduate program. That set the stage for my career in health administration.”