School of Medicine Welcomes MD Class of 2029 in Traditional White Coat Ceremony
In welcoming 139 first-year medical students to the first step of their medical training, White Coat Ceremony keynote speaker Rod Hochman, MD (CAMED’79, CAS’79), reflected on donning his white coat for the first time 50 years ago.
Keynote speaker Rod Hochman MD, (CAMED’79, CAS’79), CEO emeritus of Providence Health & Services addressing incoming medical students at the Aug. 4 ceremony on Talbot Green.
“If you’d asked me back then what my career would look like, I would have been mostly wrong,” said Hochman, CEO emeritus of Providence Health & Services. He and his wife Nancy (Sargent’77, ’83) recently gave $10 million to build the new Rod Hochman Family Clinical Skills & Simulation Center and previously established the Rod Hochman Family Scholarship Fund supporting medical students.
“There are easier (career) paths – business, finance, consulting – but none will offer the kind of fulfillment that comes from a life spent healing, listening and making a difference,” he said.
The Aug. 4 ceremony on Talbot Green organized by the MD Student Affairs Office, centers on faculty helping the new medical students put on the iconic white coat of a physician, emblematic of the transfer of knowledge from one generation to the next.
“Donning the white coat symbolizes your entry and commitment to the professional expectations, responsibilities and obligations of becoming a doctor,” said Hee-Young Park, PhD, dean ad interim.
(right to left) Matthew Alves, Afzalkbek Fayzullaev and Taylor Aibana walk by admiring parents and friends after receiving their white coats.
Associate Dean of Student Affairs Angela Jackson, MD, told students the ceremony is “visible evidence you are joining this profession, taking your first steps along the path to a demanding but rewarding and meaningful career in medicine.”
Drawn from 11,483 applicants, this is the 177th entering class of medical students, said Kristen Hanssen, MD, associate dean of admissions. Students hail from 32 states and 17 countries, speak 28 different languages and range in age from 20 into their 30s.
William Wang receives his white coat from Assistant Professor of Medicine Seth Tobolsky, MD.Their personal stories are just as varied. For William Wang, medical school wasn’t always a certainty. His parents immigrated from China and worked long days at their restaurant. Wang helped there after school, on weekends and holidays.
The family was poor and had to travel long distances to get affordable health care. The experience fed Wang’s desire to become a physician.
The restaurant faltered soon after Wang graduated from BU with a degree in biomedical engineering.
“At the time, I thought if I went to medical school, I wouldn’t be able to help the family, I’d just accumulate more debt,” he said.
After four years working at a private equity firm, family finances had improved, and Wang resumed his journey.
Hellen Edwards puts on her white coat for the first time as a member of the Class of 2029. Hellen Edwards always had a medical career in mind, but other opportunities cropped up. For financial and personal reasons, the Hawaii native joined Reserve Officers’ Training Corps as a freshman chemistry major at BU. Now 34 and an Air Force major, Edwards is returning to BU with 10 years active duty behind her including postings in Montana, Okinawa and Washington, D.C., where she led monitoring efforts related to biological threats and weapons of mass destruction.
“That desire to practice medicine never really left me,” said Edwards. “After all these other experiences I came back to medicine and serving people. That’s where my heart is.”
A lifelong gymnast, Alma Kuc is resilient, but that was tested in January 2025 when her family home burned to the ground in Los Angeles’ Palisades fire. Kuc knows all about getting back up after you’ve been knocked down. A member of the Polish national gymnastics team and an All-American at UC Berkley who competed in two world championships, Kuc saw her share of success, but also failure.
“I’ve become resilient, and gymnastics has helped with that because you fall a lot and you just have to keep on going,” said Kuc. The injuries piled up with four major surgeries that involved long rehabs, which helped convince her to enter medical school and become a physician.
Amarachi “Amy” Opara knows firsthand what a debilitating disease does to a child and a family. From a young age, and continuing through high school and college, Opara assumed a larger role with helping to care for her younger sister who has cerebral palsy and other developmental issues while her mother— a pharmacist originally from Nigeria – worked long hours to support the family.
“It’s what brought me to medicine,” said Opara. “It all stems from growing up with a sister with special needs.”
Angelina Thomas, Kyra Bess, Abijah Pennant, Jaylan Ezike and Marley Lucas in their new white coats at the reception following the ceremony.
For Eric Yang, it was the unexpected illness and death of two mentors in his formative years that propelled him into a medical career. A gifted clarinetist, Yang was devastated by the death from cancer of a teacher who had shepherded him into a prestigious pre-college music program at Juilliard. When a second mentor was forced into early retirement by dementia, Yang shifted his focus away from a future career in music and toward his growing interest in biomedical science.
“I wanted answers to questions like ‘Why were they taken away from me?’” said Yang. At the University of Pennsylvania, he majored in neuroscience followed by two years as a clinical research coordinator at the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia where he developed an interest in gene therapies for leukodystrophies.
“The best way to understand the newest developments in rare diseases is to be directly involved,” said Yang, who intends to continue research in medical school.
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Watch the ceremony here.