Bright lights, bigger dreams
Last year, our school moved into a beautiful new building and inaugurated a completely revamped curriculum. We received a record amount of research support and made truly remarkable progress in new discovery and innovation as a result. We worked with community leaders to help save a public hospital that provides vital clinical services to Atlanta and beyond. And we are moving forward with plans to construct a new clinic that will help us translate research more easily into care and serve our patients better.
Some might argue that our dreams already have come true. Certainly our forefathers would be amazed and humbled by how far we’ve come in a short 154 years.
When I interact with those who surround me daily here at Emory, however, I can’t help but say that we must keep on dreaming.
I am inspired beyond words, for example, when I look into the bright young faces of the next generation of doctors, when I see not just their smarts but also their eagerness to take action to make health care better and more accessible to all.
I am inspired by our hard-working faculty—by the unexpected turns their work can take when they collaborate across disciplines, by the creativity and enthusiasm they invest in teaching, by the concern and commitment they show their patients.
And I am grateful to those who partner with us, to organizations like Georgia Research Alliance and Georgia Cancer Coalition, to Georgia Institute of Technology (with which we share a department), and to Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta, Atlanta VA Medical Center, Grady Hospital, Morehouse School of Medicine, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the NIH—the list goes on and on.
Together, all these make it possible for us to dream bigger dreams for tomorrow.
Thomas J. Lawley, MD
Dean, Emory University School of Medicine
