Hello, Match Day IRL! (And goodbye, Zoom.)

Match Day is back. 

After two years during which Match Day ceremonies were held virtually due to the pandemic, the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA held the event in person on March 18 — and it was bigger and better than ever. 

A crowd of 400 excited guests filled Irma and Norman Switzer Plaza behind Geffen Hall, clutching countless smartphone cameras, dozens of floral bouquets and more than a few adorable babies. The scene rippled with embraces and nervous smiles.

The 155 students in the medical school’s class of 2022 perched on the edges of their seats, eager to open their acceptance envelopes and learn to which institutions they matched for their medical residency, or advanced training in their clinical specialty.

“The past two years have been so challenging, both personally and professionally,” Dr. Lee Miller, the medical school’s associate dean of student affairs, told them. “You were pulled from classrooms and clinical settings to navigate remote learning environments. You became masters of learning on Zoom and had to navigate virtual interviewing for residencies.”

Depending on the student’s chosen field, Match Day can influence where they will live and work for the three to seven years after graduating from UCLA. 

At precisely 9 a.m., the same time as their medical school peers around the country, the UCLA students ripped open their acceptance envelopes. Whoops of joy, wails of relief and emotional sobs filled the plaza.

For Fitz Gerald Diala, who immigrated to the U.S. at 14, achieving his match was both a personal and professional milestone.

“I dream about being able to expand ophthalmology education and to increase the level of practice in Nigeria, where I come from,” he told KTLA News. Diala will be moving across the country to train in ophthalmology at Vanderbilt University in Nashville.

Eden Patton’s elated reaction to matching at UC San Francisco for an anesthesiology residency was captured in a Los Angeles Times photograph.

“It means everything,” Patton told KTLA. “Things that I wished for such a long time ago, things that my family and I really worked toward. I’m endlessly grateful to UCLA for helping me get to this point.”

According to Miller, nearly half of the medical school’s 2022 graduates will study primary care in the fall, and 20% will train to become surgeons. Three-quarters of the class will remain in the West, and 25% of the class will pursue their residencies at UCLA. 

Original Article: "Hello, Match Day IRL! (And goodbye, Zoom.)"