Summertime greetings to all!
So much has been going on — seemingly everywhere — since the last issue of the Alumni Magazine was published! No matter where in the country (or in the world) you live and work, the COVID-19 pandemic and its ramifications have continued to test our mettle in many ways. And yet, we have kept going and have made progress in our professional and personal lives despite it all! I am pleased to share with you the ways your Alumni Association has adapted to the challenges of the times and to fill you in on important recent developments.
The Alumni Association Board of Directors has continued to meet regularly thanks to Zoom videoconferencing. The board’s four committees — Awards, Cultivation & Engagement, Finance, and Nominating — have been hard at work. We recently elected eight new directors to the board, which now counts 26 members. Our newest board members are graduates of Hahnemann University, Medical College of Pennsylvania, MCP Hahnemann University and Drexel University College of Medicine. They include a biochemist-pharmaceutical executive, an emergency physician, an interventional radiologist, a gastroenterologist, a psychiatrist and three surgical subspecialists. All of them bring their talents and perspectives to our board, and we are thrilled they have volunteered to serve the Alumni Association.
Throughout 2020 and 2021, the board continued to support medical students’ attendance at (now virtual) conferences, and earlier this year contributed to the launch of a newly established food bank at Queen Lane for College of Medicine students, the Student Cupboard. We are especially delighted to bring our newest alumni to the association and extend a welcome to the 234 master’s, 14 PhD, 240 MD, two dual MD/MS, and five MD/PhD graduates in the class of 2021, who received their diplomas this past spring, on May 18. You are officially members of the Alumni Association!
At Alumni Weekend in May, our association recognized the work and contributions of nine remarkable graduates of our medical and biomedical programs. You can read more about them and the 2021 Alumni Awards in the pages that follow. Alumni Weekend brought 50-year, 30-year and 25-year reunions and celebrations for the graduates of 1971, 1991 and 1996. We also toasted and applauded the milestone classes of 1970, 1990 and 1995, whose reunions last May were derailed by the pandemic. We are so proud of all of our alumni!
All of the members of the Alumni Association board value our alumni, and I invite you to become involved in the association in any way you can. We also really do want to hear from you! Write us at medical.alumni@drexel.edu to share your ideas and updates, and to let us know what matters to you as an alum. You can check us out on the web at drexel.edu/medicine/alumni, and on Facebook or LinkedIn. You can connect with other alumni on Dragon Network, the alumni/student professional mentoring platform. And, just as I mentioned in the last issue of the magazine, however you choose to get in touch, I hope to get to meet you — virtually or in person — sooner rather than later!
Claudia S. Plottel, MD, MCP ’84
President, Alumni Association Board of Directors