As excited families and friends looked on from the pews of Rockefeller Memorial Chapel, 91 new first-year Pritzker School of Medicine students received their white coats Sunday, marking the beginning of their journey to becoming physicians.
The ceremony, a tradition founded at Pritzker in 1989 and now held widely across U.S. medical schools, recognized the entering class of 2024 as they begin their medical training. After receiving their first white coat from their new society career advisors, the students together recited the Physician’s Oath.
Prior to receiving their white coats, the students heard from keynote speaker Iris Romero, MD, MS, who challenged the new students to consider three key questions: “Why are you here?” “What will sustain you?” and “How did you get here?”
A Professor of Obstetrics & Gynecology and Executive Vice Dean of the Biological Sciences Division and the Pritzker School of Medicine, Romero drew on challenges from her own story, recounting personal trials and the sacrifices her mother and grandmother made to provide opportunities for her to impart that students must not forget how they got where they are.
“I encourage you all to hold close to your heart and honor your cumulative privilege—whatever it may be—that brought you here today to start your journey to becoming a doctor,” Romero said.
Romero also told students to find what will help them weather the many great challenges they are certain to encounter throughout their careers. Sharing two of the things that sustain her--courage and proximity--she urged the group remain proximate to the patients and communities they will care for in the years ahead, getting to know them as much more than their medical diagnoses or disparities.
“When you are proximate to the patient or the community, you will see more, you will understand more, and you will do more,” Romero said. “This is what it means to be a Pritzker School of Medicine doctor. This is the mission that will sustain you through the difficult times ahead.
“So, wear your white coat proudly, knowing that you belong here and that with that white coat comes great responsibility.”
The new class includes 81 MD-seeking students and 10 also pursuing PhDs. Among the group representing 28 states (plus Puerto Rico) and 50 undergraduate institutions, 43 percent come from backgrounds underrepresented in medicine--putting Pritzker among the most diverse medical schools in the U.S.--and 13 percent are first generation college students. Additionally, 84 percent of the matriculating class took at least one gap year before starting medical school.
The Pritzker School of Medicine is grateful for the support of the Bucksbaum Institute for Clinical Excellence for the stethoscopes the students received, the Arnold P. Gold Foundation for the pins that were provided on the white coat to symbolize humanism in medicine, and the Medical Biological Sciences Alumni Association for their support of the White Coat Ceremony.