2023 Convocation Hooding and Awards Ceremony caps eventful year for the Class of 2023

They started before the pandemic and finished in a new pharmacy building. The Class of 2023 has seen it all. 

The MUSC College of Pharmacy today celebrates the Class of 2023 during the 2023 Hooding Convocation and Awards Ceremony, held for the first time at Charleston Music Hall. The ceremony begins at 4 p.m. After today's college ceremony, the Class of 2023 will participate in MUSC's 192nd Commencement Exercise on Saturday, May 20, 2023. 

Notes of Distinction, The Class of 2023

• They started in August 2019 -- right after the college hired an architect for the new building and right before it announced the largest gift in college history.
• In the spring of 2020, they got hit with the pandemic. 
• They dealt with the in-person-remote learning seesaw teachers and students had to ride in 2020-2021. 
• They saw the groundbreaking, the topping out, and finally the grand opening of the new building. 
• Now they will be the first class to celebrate their hooding and convocation at the Charleston Music Hall.

Class highlights

• The MUSC enterprise celebrated the honor graduates of the Class of 2023 Thursday with the Honor Graduate Luncheon. Brittany Houston was recognized as the college's No. 1 honor graduate and Cameron Brakefield as its No. 2 honor graduate.
• Each year The Catalyst has a special Commencement issue featuring a graduate from each college. This year, the College of Pharmacy student featured is Mattie Hucks. She was pictured with brother Collin Hucks, whom she inspired to follow in her MUSC pharmacy footsteps.
• The Class of 2023 residency match rate of 94.6 percent eclipsed the national average of 81.8 percent, was the highest in South Carolina, and higher than many of the finest pharmacy schools in the Southeast, including UNC, Florida, UGA, and the University of Kentucky.
• The Class of 2023 is part of the Palmetto Experiential Education Partnership (PEEP) and helps choose the PEEP Preceptors of the Year. This year, they selected: Katherine Kinlaw, Danielle King, Brandon Bookstaver, Anthony DeClue, Brian Clark, Betsy Blake, Emily Heubel, Stephane Sarratt, Kyle Weant and Jill Thompson.

Class of 2023 on social media

• The Class of 2023 is getting introduced one by one on the college's social media channels this month, giving friends and family a chance to cheer and share. Look for the MUSC College of Pharmacy channels on Instagram, Facebook, and LinkedIn to offer congratulations! 
• One of the members of the Class of 2023, Amanda Everett Forrest, coordinated the effort on behalf of her classmates, from designing the template to surveying the class to collecting the pictures to scheduling the posts. She caps an outstanding pharmacy student career with one last major service to her college and colleagues. 

Convocation speaker

• The Class of 2023 will get one last dose of inspiration when entrepreneur and alumna Kelli Garrison ’02 R '04 gives the keynote address at the 2023 Hooding Convocation and Awards Celebration on Friday, May 19, 2023 at Charleston Music Hall. She served MUSC for 18 years in patient care, medication safety, student and resident training, and information technology. Recently, she launched an independent executive consulting firm, Verdant Consulting, and is serving as a VP/CIO Executive Advisor for Epic.

Convocation location

The Charleston Music Hall looks a little bit like a castle. It is a highly intentional characteristic dating back to its origin. 

• Built in 1849-1850 as a passenger station of the South Carolina Railroad, its original entrance was large enough to admit a train!
• The architect, Edward C. Jones, wanted "to make a train's arrival at the station a dramatic experience... [so he] decorated the building with projecting turrets, traceried lancet windows, pointed arch niches... even simulated arrow slots."
• Bought by a bagging manufacturer, the building was largely destroyed in an 1886 earthquake. 
• It sat vacant for 60 years before being turned into an arts venue by the Bennett-Hofford Company in 1995. The highlight of its storied existence, of course, takes place May 19, 2023.  

Class of 2023 Commencement

MUSC has been working diligently to determine how to offer a safe and memorable commencement exercise for the 2023 graduates. The 192nd Commencement Exercise will be:  

• Saturday, May 20, 2023
• North Charleston Coliseum
• 10 a.m. Ceremony