Match Day provides long- awaited answers
The largest graduating class in Vanderbilt University School of Medicine history delivered big results on Match Day in March as 116 fourth-year students matched with some of the country’s top residency programs.
Match Day, the culmination of a yearlong process that connects students with medical centers and hospitals across the country through the National Residency Match Program (NRMP), is a longstanding tradition filled with joy, excitement, accomplishment, occasional dejection and lots of nerves.
Twenty-eight members of the 2010 class are staying at Vanderbilt for their residency.
Match Day is generally known as the ‘first day of the rest of your life’ for students like Annie Antar, who coincidentally also had the first day of her life at Vanderbilt when she was born here on Nov. 12, 1980. Antar is one of 14 Medical Scientist Training Program (MSTP) students who graduated in May. The MSTP program prepares M.D./Ph.D. students for faculty and research positions of leadership in biomedical sciences.
Antar, who is going to Johns Hopkins Hospital for internal medicine, said interviewing at the country’s leading medical centers has proved to her how well Vanderbilt prepares its students and supports them throughout the process.
Five couples matched together, including Dan Spratt and Ellie Gordon, who married on May 2.
They are heading to Spartanburg, S.C., for a transitional year before moving to New York, where Dan is pursuing radiation oncology at Memorial Sloan-Kettering while Ellie is working to become a dermatologist at NYU School of Medicine.
Their chosen fields are among the most competitive for residency slots and to match together is particularly difficult.
They met during their first year of medical school and wed on May 2. “We are each others’ biggest fans. It’s been great to go through this together,” Spratt said.
