At the 100th diploma ceremony of the Yale School of Nursing on May 18 at the Shubert Theatre, graduates, families, faculty, and alumni gathered to mark a historic milestone while celebrating the Class of 2026 and a century of nursing education and leadership.
Dean Azita Emami opened the ceremony by reflecting on the School’s legacy and the responsibility carried forward by new graduates. “For a century YSN has educated the nurse-leaders who made our profession what it is today,” she said. “Until today, you have been our students. You are about to become our colleagues.”
Emami emphasized that graduates now join a profession that spans clinical care, research, policy, education, and global health leadership. She encouraged them to take pride in their identity as Yale nurses and the values they carry forward in service to better health for all people.
The keynote address was delivered by Cheryl Chia-Hui Chen, chair and professor at National Taiwan University School of Nursing and executive director of nursing at National Taiwan University Hospital, as well as a Yale School of Nursing alumna. Chen described her journey helping establish Taiwan’s first university-based nurse practitioner program after graduating from Yale, transforming what she called a “profession that did not yet exist” in her home country into a national health workforce of more than 15,000 nurse practitioners.
“When I returned to Taiwan, I had a choice: wait for permission or build the house,” Chen said. She urged graduates to “build, trust, and lead,” emphasizing that nurses must help define health systems rather than wait for roles to be created for them. “The world does not need you to fit into leadership,” she said. “It needs you to redefine it.”
Following the keynote, Emami reflected on Chen’s message, reinforcing the role of nurses as system builders and leaders. “When there is no path or no system, do not wait for it to be built; you build it,” she said.
Student speakers highlighted the evolving role of nursing in a rapidly changing health care landscape. Omolara Goyea, a Doctor of Nursing Practice graduate in Executive Healthcare Leadership, Systems, and Policy, spoke about the importance of addressing social determinants of health and ensuring nurses help shape emerging technologies such as artificial intelligence. “Nursing has never just been about care,” she said. “It is also about impact.”
Family Nurse Practitioner graduate Heidi Willard emphasized the human connection at the heart of nursing practice. “The privilege of nursing is not simply that we get to care for people,” she said. “It is that people allow us into the most vulnerable moments of their lives.”
Deputy Dean Tatiana Sadak recognized student award recipients, including Samantha Mensah, recipient of the Charles King Jr. Memorial Prize; Jessicamarie Fox, recipient of the Milton and Anne Sidney Prize; and Jessie Laurore, recipient of the Heather Dawn Reynolds Equity Award.
Sadak also highlighted the significance of the nursing pinning tradition, through which graduates formally join the Yale nursing alumni community, symbolizing both achievement and responsibility.
As the ceremony concluded, Emami congratulated the Class of 2026 and welcomed them into the next chapter of their professional journey. The celebration marked both a milestone 100th commencement and the beginning of a new century of Yale nurses advancing health equity, innovation, and care around the world.