To the School of Medicine Community: 
The Wayne State University School of Medicine will welcome yet another new class of future physicians and graduate medical scientists this summer, renewing an annual ceremony that we have celebrated now for 141 years.
While the admission of a new class and their donning of the short white coat continue our tradition of training the doctors this nation so desperately needs, a new feature will be added to our rituals. This incoming class will be the first to utilize the new Richard J. Mazurek, M.D., Medical Education Commons for its entire education at our School of Medicine.
The building may be new, but it will quickly be assimilated into our longstanding core missions of medical education, scientific research and patient care. The core of the facility is expected to be the Clinical Skills Center, where students will be placed in actual operating room settings to treat simulation mannequins that speak, breathe and bleed. And while the “bells and whistles” aspects of this center are certainly impressive and provide us a vital training tool, the smaller rooms that surround the center may be even more important. These patient exam rooms will bring students into a real-life, one-on-one setting with “patients,” an aspect of medicine that, regardless of any new science, remains the one constant in our chosen profession.
We have many people to thank for the creation of what will quickly be called around campus “The Mazurek.” The people who donated a cumulative $35 million to construct and equip the building did so out of a strong belief in our ongoing missions. Many of those same donors graduated from our School of Medicine quite some time ago. Their dedication exemplifies their ongoing commitment to medicine and their knowledge that the basis of all medicine is people caring for people. This sense of commitment shared by our ever-expanding School of Medicine family is tangible evidence of the success of our educational process, and will soon be ingrained in the fabric of our newest students.
I know that you look forward to being revitalized and renewed by the spirit of our young colleagues and by the knowledge that, with your help, they will continue the Wayne State tradition of outstanding medicine and service to our community.
Valerie Parisi, M.D., M.P.H., M.B.A.Interim Dean
Wayne State University
School of Medicine