Saluting the Class of 2025
Dear CUIMC community,
As we end the academic year, we would like to express our deepest gratitude and admiration for our shining graduates and for all members of our remarkable community. During a time of great challenge and tumult, you demonstrated inspiring dedication and resilience, continuing to advance our mission with the highest levels of academic and scientific excellence.
To our graduates: congratulations on all that you have achieved. We have been honored to be a part of your academic and professional journeys. You will shape the fields of medicine, dentistry, public health, and nursing—and we have never needed you more. You will carry on our values of compassionate care, rigorous research, integrity, respect, collaboration, and community engagement to improve the health of individuals and populations. You will always be members of our community, and we can’t wait to see all that you accomplish.
To our faculty and staff: We want to thank you for guiding and supporting our graduates, serving as mentors and teachers, all while making groundbreaking contributions to science and academia. You go above and beyond for our students in so many ways, with a deep belief in the power of education, and we are immensely appreciative of your commitment to training the next generation of leaders.
The week’s ceremonies are a source of pride and joy for Columbia. We look forward to hearing from our inspiring class day speakers, including Dr. Karen P. West, president and CEO of the American Dental Education Association (Dental), Dr. Vivek Murthy, former surgeon general of the United States (Public Health), Mary Woolley, president and CEO of Research!America (Nursing), and Dr. Siddhartha Mukherjee, author and VP&S associate professor of medicine (VP&S). Thank you to our wonderful staff and volunteers who have planned these events over many months.
With great uncertainties and hardships all around us, we are thankful to be part of a community that is dedicated to life’s most noble pursuits: improving human health, curing disease, preventing illness, and alleviating suffering. With this, we are optimistic for a brighter future.
All our best,
Lorraine Frazier, PhD, RN
Dean, School of Nursing
Linda P. Fried, MD, MPH
Dean, Mailman School of Public Health
James McKiernan, MD
Interim Dean of the Faculties of Health Sciences and the Vagelos College of Physicians and Surgeons
Acting Executive Vice President for Health and Biomedical Sciences
Dennis Mitchell, DDS, MPH
Interim Dean, College of Dental Medicine