MUSC College of Pharmacy celebrates the Class of 2022

The more challenging the journey, the sweeter the finish. The MUSC College of Pharmacy Class of 2022 weathered the COVID storm to process triumphantly across the stage on Friday, May 20 to don their doctoral hoods. The Pharm.D. graduates were celebrated at the Awards Ceremony and Hooding Convocation at Charleston Gaillard Center and the Ph.D. graduates were celebrated at the MUSC College of Graduate Studies (CGS) ceremony at the Charleston Music Hall.

So today I will close by asking you to meet the real treasures within you,” said keynote speaker Helen Sairany, CEO of the South Carolina Pharmacy Association (SCPhA). “Take care of each other, and always listen to your heart, for what comes from the heart, goes to the heart. Love always finds its way home. This world might be in a shaky state, but today I see hope in all of you and hope is what we need to guide tomorrow.”

Seventy-one students earned their Pharm.D.s, 11 of whom also earned an MBA from The Citadel through the college’s concurrent degree program. In the CGS ceremony, four graduate students earned their Ph.D.s through the college’s Department of Drug Discovery and Biomedical Sciences: Jonathan Turner, M.D./Ph.D., Catherine Mills, Ph.D., Kareem Heslop, Ph.D., and Thomas Z. Benton, Ph.D.

“Earning an advanced degree is a challenge under any circumstances,” said Philip Hall, dean of the MUSC College of Pharmacy. “The Class of 2022 met each hurdle in stride with undiminished spirit and resilience, as befits the leaders and groundbreakers they will become. We are proud to call them MUSC pharmacy alumni.”

A number of students were recognized with individual awards.

• Excellence in Clinical Communication Award: Henry Bernard Best, III.
• The Merck Academic Excellence Award: Calynn Dioses and Lyric Chaplin
• Outstanding Community Service Award: Anna Kroninger, Linh Hazard and Brianne Slaven
• Outstanding Diversity & Inclusion Award: Keturah Mingledolph
• Outstanding Innovation Award: Matthew Brock and Alyssa Muraoka
• Outstanding Interprofessionalism Award: Hannah Henson and Sarah Taylor
• Outstanding Leadership Award: Coleman Parler and Sarah Wyatt
• Outstanding Pharmacy Practice Award: Paige Austin and Krishna Shah
• Outstanding Professionalism Award: Rory Thomas.
• Outstanding Research Award: Bethany Burnette and Sarah Rowe
• Outstanding Scholastic Achievement Award: Bethanie Burnette (First Honor), Ahmed Alanazi (Second Honor) Drew Sauck (Second Honor)
• VIATRIS™ Excellence in Pharmacy Award: Kathy Le
• William A. Prout Award: Emily Overly

A photo slideshow of the CGS event is available on the CGS Facebook page, which also features posts on Ph.D. graduates Heslop and Mills.

Speaker Helen Sairany, who arrived in America in 1996 as a Kurdish refugee from Iraq and is now a celebrated author, world traveler, pharmacist, and executive, offered the Class of 2022 seven life hints (see full speech at her Colors Make me Happy blog):

1. Learn to ask for help! 
2. Become Comfortable with being uncomfortable
3. Learn to Speak Last! 
4. Travel the world! 
5. Always plan for things to go unplanned! 
6. Know that sometimes you are the problem. 
7. People Matter! 

After the graduates were hooded, they were announced by Cathy Worrall, associate dean for admissions and student life, and then they were administered the "Oath of a Pharmacist" by faculty member and class advisor Yuri Peterson. The event closed with the class being welcomed to the  profession of pharmacy by Sairany on behalf of SCPhA, Carolyn Bell on behalf of the South Carolina Society of Health-System Pharmacists, and faculty member and alumnus David Shirley on behalf of the MUSC Pharmacy Alumni Association.