Giving in Action
Giving in Action: Continuing innovations in reconstructive surgery
Mar. 27, 2024—It is no surprise that G. Patrick Maxwell, BA’68, MD’72, and Galen Perdikis, MD, have crossed paths at several points throughout their distinguished careers in plastic surgery. Not only do they both have ties to Vanderbilt and a shared dedication to advancing the practice of breast reconstruction surgery for patients who have undergone mastectomies, but...
Giving in Action: The Class of 1968, and the Power of the Collective
Mar. 27, 2024—When members of the Class of 1968 got together in fall 2023 for their 55th reunion, there were many memories to share and reasons to celebrate. For one, their 1968 School of Medicine Class Scholarship fund, to which 26 class members have contributed as of November 2023, has a value of approximately $1.8 million. More...
Giving in Action: Dean’s Scholarship Challenge Exceeds its Goal at $26 Million
Jul. 18, 2023—We all know the impact a scholarship can have on a student: It’s life changing. At the beginning of 2022, the School of Medicine launched a $5 million Dean’s Scholarship Challenge to help ensure that tomorrow’s leaders in medicine are educated at Vanderbilt. The yearlong matching gift effort, which ended Dec. 31, 2022, aimed to...
Giving in Action: A Gift That Keeps On Giving
Jul. 18, 2023—From the time she was 8 years old, Annie Marie Garraway, PhD, and her family lived in the South, first in Alabama, then in Tennessee, and finally in Alabama again. Early on, she was aware of the Vanderbilt name and of Vanderbilt University specifically. “My late brother, Levi Watkins Jr., made the university real for...
Giving in Action: A Shared Purpose…Then and Now
Jan. 3, 2023—When Vanderbilt University School of Medicine Class of 1997 alumni Matt and Carol Kikkawa Hook connected with Vanderbilt to discuss charitable support, they had no intention of serving as class chairs for their 25th Reunion. They simply focused on exploring how their giving could make a difference. As discussions continued, they learned that the 1997...
Giving in Action: Katie Cox Johnson Memorial Scholarship
Jan. 3, 2023—Compassionate, humble, hardworking, inspiring. Ask the members of the Class of 2007 how they remember Katie Cox Johnson, MD’07, and these are some of the many warm words you will hear. After Johnson died in 2019 at age 38 following a battle with multiple sclerosis and cervical cancer, her close friend, Jessica Sparks Lilley, MD’07,...
Giving in Action: Creating Opportunities for Future Leaders in Medicine
May. 16, 2022—John Cobb, MD’78, remembers vividly what it was like working summer jobs as a student to help pay for his tuition and living expenses. The summer before his senior year at Emory University, he was a scrub tech at Children’s Egleston Hospital in Atlanta, an experience that solidified his desire to pursue medicine as a...
Giving in Action: Creating Hope From Heartbreak
May. 16, 2022—When talking with James Buescher about the newly created Margaret McCullough Buescher Scholarship at the Vanderbilt University School of Medicine, he emphasizes the qualities of his late wife, Margaret, who was always motivated to help others. He hopes to extend that part of her spirit through the students who benefit from the scholarship and are...
Giving in Action: Luu Chen Scholarship
Oct. 18, 2021—Whether they are practicing health care, starting a new venture or making philanthropic decisions, Alexandria Luu, MPH’20, and Cherry Chen, MD, pictured at left, are driven by values. “Giving others opportunity and supporting what is important to us is really at the heart of it all,” said Luu. In February 2021, the couple endowed the...
Giving in Action: Patricia and Rodes Hart Chair in Urologic Surgery
Oct. 14, 2021—Rodes Hart, BA’54, and Patricia Ingram Hart, BA’57, whose generous gifts continue to advance the mission of Vanderbilt as one of the world’s great universities for learning and discovery, have endowed a second chair in Urologic Surgery. Melissa Kaufman, MD, PhD, professor of Urology and chief of the Division of Reconstructive Urology and Pelvic Health,...
Giving in Action: Eskind Chair to support autism research
Mar. 19, 2021—Donna and Jeffrey Eskind, whose generous gifts have advanced Vanderbilt research that is improving lives, have made a new commitment of $2 million to endow a new chair in autism spectrum disorder research in the School of Medicine. This investment will enable Vanderbilt to recruit or retain a senior expert in an area of research...
Giving in Action: Honoring family and the value of education
Mar. 19, 2021—Laura Webb Lamps, MD’92, HS, FE, is quick to describe what made her medical school experience special: the people. “The faculty really set the bar for caring, and our class followed suit. If someone wasn’t in class, a peer or a professor would follow up to check on that person.” In her second year of...
Giving in Action: Alum credits achievements and success to Vanderbilt
Oct. 5, 2020—John B. Neeld, BA’62, MD’66, has a loyalty to Vanderbilt that runs deep. “Everything I’ve achieved — my successful career in medicine and medical politics —I owe to Vanderbilt. It all came from this place.” Neeld was able to attend Vanderbilt as an undergraduate because of a National Merit Scholarship. His father was a clerk...
Giving in Action: Unexpected connections
Oct. 5, 2020—When Rachana Haliyur, PhD’18, MD’20, graduated from Vanderbilt in May, it represented the culmination of a nearly lifelong path toward becoming a physician-scientist. As a child, Haliyur’s parents — who were engineers — put a strong emphasis on asking questions and thinking critically. They also provided early exposure to science and technology. By the time...
Giving in Action: Michael, MD’76, and Melissa Lojek, PhD’78
Mar. 12, 2020—For Michael Lojek, MD’76, and his wife, Melissa, PhD’78, “generosity” is one of the words that comes to mind when they think about Vanderbilt. “Vanderbilt was very generous to me, to my wife, and to other students in graduate and medical school,” Michael said. “I very much appreciated that generosity of Vanderbilt all those years...
Giving in Action: Brian Drolet, MD’09
Mar. 12, 2020—Brian Drolet, MD’09, remembers the fortuitous phone call that dramatically changed the trajectory of his life. It was April 15, 2005 — the deadline to decide which medical school he would attend the following fall. A few hours earlier, he had essentially decided to attend Dartmouth, near his family in New Hampshire. His father, hoping...
Giving in Action: Class of 1978 Scholarship
Sep. 9, 2019—When the idea came to create an endowed scholarship in honor of their 30th Reunion, members of the School of Medicine Class of 1978 answered the call with resounding enthusiasm. “People immediately stepped up to make a gift, and we were able to get it endowed and bestow it upon a scholar the very next...
Giving in Action: Armstrong Family Funds
Sep. 9, 2019— The story of Richard Armstrong, PhD, is a shining example of how one person’s life and legacy can have a powerful ripple effect on the people and places dear to them. Armstrong served as a member of the Vanderbilt University School of Medicine, Basic Sciences faculty from 1995 until his death in 2015. He...
Giving in Action: The Cycle of Giving
Feb. 28, 2019—Perseverance runs through Ellen Hrabovsky’s blood. Throughout her life, she’s experienced many obstacles, but through it all, she’s remained strong and loyal — serving her patients, animals and the environment to her fullest. Now, Hrabovsky, MD’69, BS’65, is giving back to the school that helped prepare her for a groundbreaking career in pediatric surgery through...
Giving in Action: Investing in the Future
Feb. 28, 2019—David Gershenson always knew he’d become a doctor. He spent his childhood tagging along while his father, a general practitioner, made house calls throughout southern Illinois. Gershenson noticed the impact his father had on his patients and their community and resolved to have the same influence one day. Today, Gershenson, MD’71, professor of Gynecologic Oncology...
Giving in Action: Honoring their son’s legacy
Sep. 13, 2018—Two new scholarships at Vanderbilt University — one at Vanderbilt Law School, the other at the School of Medicine — have been named in honor of alumnus Rick Ferrini, JD’11. Divya and Vino Ferrini of Dallas have pledged $1 million to establish both the Rick V. N. Ferrini Law Scholarship and Rick V. N. Ferrini...
Giving in Action: Paying it forward
Sep. 13, 2018—You could say Tom Brown’s future was set at an early age. His English teacher took one look at his handwriting and told him, “You better be a doctor.” While more drove him to medicine than his hard-to-decipher handwriting, Brown, MD’69, BA’65, has worked as a cardiologist for Iowa Heart Center for more than 40...
Giving in Action: Tragedy begets generosity
Feb. 28, 2018—Keith Nolop, MD’79, was a brilliant physician and researcher whose life was cut short in 2016 due to trauma from a bicycle accident. To create something positive out of this tragedy and to commemorate his life as a physician-researcher, his brothers, Neil and Bruce, endowed the Keith Nolop, M.D. Scholarship at the School of Medicine...
Giving in Action: Finding heart in a lung transplant
Feb. 28, 2018—Barbara Rosser Merz and Glenn Merz both lost spouses to a rare lung disease, but found each other and a renewed sense of gratitude. When her husband, Vernon, received his lung transplant at Vanderbilt in 1997, Barbara Rosser started a support group for lung transplant families. The group met frequently, helped one another during difficult...
Giving in Action: Family First for Distinguished Alum
Sep. 22, 2017—Although Richard B. Johnston Jr., M.D., ‘61, BA’57, is a renowned immunologist and pediatrician, it’s his family that makes him most grateful and proud. Johnston — who has dedicated his life’s work to improving the health of children — received the Vanderbilt University Alumni Association Distinguished Alumni Award this spring. The honor is the highest...
Giving in Action: A Vision for Change
Sep. 22, 2017—Steve Kutner, M.D.,’65, restored sight to thousands of refugees during his life, while also helping patients in his Georgia Eye Clinic to preserve their sight. Kutner died in 2016, but his spirit of giving continues. Although Kutner founded an international nonprofit, Project Vision, Jeanney Kutner says her late husband saw himself as a humanitarian, not...
Giving in Action: Welborn’s Healing Scholarship
Mar. 6, 2017—Although grief robbed Bill Welborn, M.D. ‘67, BA ‘64, of the ability to express his feelings after the death of longtime friend, Bill Johnston, M.D. ‘67, BA ‘64, the scholarship Welborn created in memory of Johnston helped him make peace with the loss. “Seeing Bill face Alzheimer’s created overwhelming feelings of frustration and sadness. Anyone...
Giving in Action: School of Medicine’s New Giving Societies
Mar. 6, 2017—Vanderbilt University School of Medicine (VUSM) has launched two new donor societies, the John E. Chapman, M.D. Society, recognizing donors who support clinical degree programs and endowed faculty chairs, and the Discovery Circle which recognizes donors to Basic Sciences. Chapman led the school from 1975-2001—the longest tenure of any dean. During that time, he conferred...
Giving in Action: Doing well by doing good
Aug. 17, 2016—Jonathan Partain, M.D.’60, BA ‘57, wanted to use his medical degree to do something good for people when he moved to Orlando, Florida, in 1968 to start his own practice that would become the Orlando Heart Center. That was the same year that Walt Disney had been secretly buying swamp land in Orlando area in...
Giving in Action: A debt of gratitude
Aug. 17, 2016—Like many physician-scientists who serve in university-based teaching hospitals, W. Bedford Waters, M.D., ‘74, BA ‘70, has investigated medical mysteries in his career. But one question remains after many years—the identity of the donor who supported his education. “John Chapman, who was dean of the School of Medicine, knew me from my work as an...
Giving in Action: Janet and Jim Ayers
Feb. 23, 2016—In 2005, Tennessee philanthropists Jim and Janet Ayers gave $10 million to help Vanderbilt University scientists find early markers for colorectal cancer that could improve diagnosis and potentially save lives. Within nine years, the gift, which established the Jim Ayers Institute for Precancer Detection and Diagnosis at Vanderbilt-Ingram Cancer Center (VICC), had yielded an impressive...
Research Saving Lives
Aug. 21, 2015—One important source of funding for young investigators is small philanthropic organizations, the grassroots groups that take up a cause and raise money, often in honor of a loved one impacted by cancer. Though their gifts may not equal the government’s spending power, they can give researchers the jumpstart they need to earn future National...
Donors Honor John W. Brock III, M.D.
Feb. 10, 2015—A Pediatric Urology Research Fund has been established in honor of Vanderbilt’s John W. Brock III, M.D., to support general research and fellows in pediatric urology. The funding is through the support from corporate and individual donors, including Bank of America led by Tennessee president John Stein, Delta Dental Plan of Tennessee led by president...
Growing to New Heights
Feb. 10, 2015—In October, the Monroe Carell Jr. Children’s Hospital at Vanderbilt launched the Growing to New Heights fundraising campaign in support of a four-floor building expansion that will help advance the size and scope of the hospital’s specialized pediatric health care programs. Patients and their families, along with community supporters and Vanderbilt University officials, gathered to...
Giving in Action + Bacardi Family Gift
Sep. 5, 2014—In Spanish folklore, the bat is a symbol of good luck, long life and family unity. It’s the perfect logo for Bacardi rum, says fourth-generation family member Jorge Bacardi. “There are over 600 people in the family now, but we’re keen on maintaining those philosophies. It’s still a family-owned company and we hope to keep...
Giving in Action + Class of 1993
Sep. 5, 2014—Whether it’s former classmates or perfect strangers coming together to support a great cause, there is no denying that there is strength in numbers. The Vanderbilt University School of Medicine (VUSM) Class of 1993 is a prime example of what a group can accomplish when it works together toward a goal. As its members prepare...