A casual observer of the UCLA School of Dentistry would note two large, brick buildings, filled with classrooms, clinics, and offices.  Someone who is more discerning would see many students hurrying around the halls, and professors delivering lectures in the classrooms as well as instructions in the clinics. 

The sharpest eye would see the school in the hands, minds and hearts of the dentists, oral surgeons, orthodontists, oral biologists, and others who have learned their skills and judgment here. 

Many graduating classes have passed through these two structures since I began teaching oral pathology here in 1971.  Your class is in the forefront of those classes. 

Since the day your application was opened in our student affairs office, you have set the national standards for dental students.

One morning this summer, nearly five years later, you will don your hood, accept your diploma and start your careers in practice, research, or continue your professional education. Once again you will set the pace against which graduates from other dental schools will be measured. 

To give you the best dental education available, our faculty has scrutinized the curriculum many times and taken numerous steps to strengthen it. Two years ago, we reorganized the curriculum to better balance the workload and to reinforce classroom learning—often the same day—by practical experiences in the clinics. 

We have taken pains to teach you more about AIDS, about infection control, and to provide you with the skills to meet the needs of your future patients.  Few, if any, other dental schools teach such advanced courses as implantology or esthetic dentistry. 

The clinical training was changed to include the vertical tier, so that you could learn your skills and knowledge better by having to teach them to the more junior students. 

Even after you leave UCLA and go on to your destiny, you are still a part of this institution. We have worked together, struggled, despaired and exulted. Together we have climbed an enormous mountain and neither you, the faculty or I will ever be the same.  This will always be your school. You will bring it life long after today’s professors, instructors and I are gone. 

An educator’s legacy is his or her students.  Decades after a professor or teacher has stopped teaching, he or she lives on in his or her students’ work, thoughts and feelings. 

Knowing you has been an immense joy to me.  I often long for the days when I taught classes regularly and had daily contact with many students. 

Our doors are always open to you.  I extend my deepest wishes for a joyful and productive future for each of you.