Today will go down in Florida Atlantic University history as the day the first class of MDs graduated from FAU’s Charles E. Schmidt College of Medicine. Family and friends cheered as 53 students walked across the stage of the Carole and Barry Kaye Performing Arts Auditorium to claim their medical degrees. They’re all going on to residencies at hospitals here and around the country to pursue specialties that include internal medicine, neurosurgery, obstetrics/gynecology, pediatrics, family medicine, radiology, radiation oncology, psychiatry, otolaryngology, pathology, anesthesiology and emergency medicine. We’re tremendously proud of them!

During the ceremony, I had the opportunity to offer a special tribute to Dick Schmidt, president of the Schmidt Family Foundation, whose generosity made FAU’s long-held dream of having a medical school come true. In 1998, Dick, his wife Barb and other officers of the Schmidt Family Foundation made a $15 million gift to FAU to establish a medical education program. The college bears the name of Dick’s late father, who was one of the university’s earliest and most generous benefactors. I had the pleasure of giving Dick the President’s Distinguished Service Medallion, the same award that was presented to his father in 1991.

Congratulations, Owl doctors!