Blake's White Coat Ceremony

"The white coat ceremony (WCC) is a relatively new ritual in some medical . . . schools that marks the student's transition from the study of preclinical to clinical health sciences. At some schools, where students begin meeting patients early in their education, the white coat ceremony is held before the first year begins" (Wikipedia).

Georgetown University School of Medicine's white coat ceremony was held in Gaston Hall, inside Healy Hall, on August 6th.  It was such a proud moment for me and Blake's parents, who were also able to make it.

Gaston Hall was absolutely breathtaking.  It's on the small side with beautiful wood paneling and stained glass windows.  President Obama gave a speech there somewhat recently.  It was the perfect setting for a ceremony.  Dorothy, Steve, and I got great seats in the balcony and didn't have to crane our necks to see at all.  

Dean Mitchell, the dean of the medical school, welcomed us.  Another retired professor gave a speech.  And then Blake walked across the stage, was coated and announced his name and hometown to the crowd!  He said it was the most people he's ever spoken in front of before! He did a great job though.

Afterward, the whole class (196 people) stood and took the Hippocratic Oath.  Then we made our way to the Med-Dent Pavilion for a nice reception.  They served champagne and catered food and huge cakes with Georgetown insignias.  The food was delicious!  I think we might have each had 3 slices of the cake too (I promise they were thin!).

It's like Where's Waldo... except it's Where's Blake!

I got to meet some of Blake's new classmates, too.  I know we'll both be busy with school, so it will be nice to have some names to put with the faces he'll mention in the future.  I think the event was a great way to kick off the beginning of his medical school career.  I know we are all proud of him!

The Proud Parents

 Steve, Dorothy, and I got to hang out a lot too this weekend.  They arrived on Thursday--just in time for the parents' orientation at GU.  I went along too, because they suspiciously don't offer a 'significant other' orientation!  The parents' orientation told some pretty interesting facts about this upcoming class at GU.  I knew that Georgetown was one of the most applied to schools for medicine, but the actual number is around 11,000 people.  Every 1 in 4 people who apply to medical school apply to Georgetown.  And they accept around 400.  Needless to say, we're very proud of Blake and all his accomplishments!

On Friday, Blake went to school and his parents and I went to Starbucks, toured Wisconsin Ave, played 12 rounds of Boggle (!), and got ready for his white coat ceremony that afternoon!

Pre-Coat :)

On Saturday, Blake and I joined his parents for a trip to IKEA!  I truly love that store haha.  We bought some houseplants and jars and some lights to go above our bed and desk and a shelf to go behind our couch.  Our apartment is even homier now!  We went to Target and did some shopping while a car was available to us.  And then we all went back to our apartment and worked!  I promise we won't always have chores for our guests! :)  We went out to Cafe Romeo's for Blake's birthday dinner and enjoyed some rockin' food.  We got to try all sorts of interesting stuff from a truly Italian mom-and-pop restaurant.

Overall, we had a great and enjoyable weekend--a good end to the summer for both of us.  We really enjoyed having Blake's parents over too!  I'm going to improve in Boggle before we all play again!

--Catie