On Thursday, May 30, Thomas Ferlito will take the stage as HSDM’s student speaker at Harvard School of Dental Medicine and Harvard Medical School’s Class Day ceremony. In preparation for that moment, Ferlito reflected on his experiences at HSDM–what they have meant to him, and how they’ll continue to shape him moving forward.

“The connections I have made here have by far been the most meaningful part of HSDM for me. Being able to collaborate with my classmates, faculty, and residents helped me to consider new ideas and think in ways that I never would have on my own,” Ferlito said...

Erica Shapiro Frenkel’s path through dental school took a slight detour when she decided at the end of her second year of dental school to pursue a PhD. Frenkel took a break from her studies at HSDM to study oral microbiology at Massachusetts Institute of Technology in the Ribbeck Lab as part of the PhD in Biological Sciences in Dental Medicine Program.

“I knew when I applied to dental school that I wanted to pursue a combined DMD/PhD program, so the decision to step away from the DMD program after my second year was obvious,” she said. “I had a great experience doing research during college and was sure that I wanted to make research part of my long-term career path.... Read more about Pushing the Boundaries

By Mirissa D. Price
The sun soaked my shoulders. Through my scrubs, I could feel a warmth I had missed, having spent the past five hours in the dental school’s basement lab.

As my eyes adjusted to the light – and the macro-scale vision – I spotted my Harvard School of Dental Medicine (HSDM) family, smiling and laughing. I claimed a seat at the table, and together, we fell into a conversation of ‘what if.’

‘What if we were millionaires and could do anything in the world?’ someone posed, imagining for a minute we didn’t have to miss the rest of this...