Touro College of Pharmacy Graduates Class of 2026 at Historic Town Hall

Patricia Salkin, JD, PhD, Senior Vice President for Academic Affairs and Provost of Touro University’s Graduate and Professional Divisions, opened the ceremonies with welcoming and congratulatory remarks.

“You each joined Touro University because you believed in something larger than yourselves – because you were drawn to a University whose mission is rooted in service, expanding access, and serving the underserved,” said Dr. Salkin. “You chose this College of Pharmacy, whose mission and vision call you to become caring and competent pharmacists and active community leaders. Today you stand ready to fulfill that calling.”

Dean and Professor of Pharmacy Practice Dr. Henry Cohen then took the audience through some of the history of pharmacy up to the development of the PharmD degree.

“Some of our ancestors were called alchemists -- dreamers who sought to turn base metals into gold, combining laboratory techniques with mysticism and laying the groundwork for modern pharmacology and chemistry,” leading eventually to the PharmD degree, which became the educational standard, and the modern, clinical role emerged. “The druggist” became the more formal “pharmacist.”

“A Promising Future”

Dean Cohen said the graduates can look forward to a promising future, as today pharmacists are rated at the top of the most trusted professions and the “go-to” community resource for advice and medication information.

Keynote Speaker Dr. Michael Hogue, Executive Vice President and CEO of the American Pharmacists Association, encouraged the graduates to embrace the current development of a “standard of care” in the pharmacy profession, like that which exists in medicine and nursing.

“Get connected, stay connected and find inspirational mentors,” he advised. “Pursue excellence. Decide that the covenant we have with our patients to ensure they receive the standard of care means you will do your work with excellence, every day.”      

Two graduating students took the stage to address classmates. Class President and Valedictorian Victoria Kostantakis and Miriam Sprei reflected on the past four years - challenges, lessons learned, experiences that shaped them, and thanked family, friends, classmates, faculty and deans.

TCOP closed out the year with good news for the school and its students. Licensing exam scores were at record levels, placing TCOP in the top rank of pharmacy schools – both locally and nationally.

Also, employment statistics are at record levels, with graduates landing prestigious fellowships, residencies and coveted positions in community pharmacy, healthcare and research.

Grads Excited about Next Steps  

Sprei will be a PGY-1 resident at VA Connecticut Healthcare System, the primary integrated health care network for veterans in CT.

“I will be rotating through specialties, getting a feel for different areas of clinical pharmacy. I like clinical pharmacy because we get to use more of the knowledge and skills we learned in school, and it’s also like a puzzle, meeting with the patient, figuring out the best treatment plan,” said Sprei, who chose to work with veterans. “I want to be able to give back. They do so much for our country.”

Mercel Danai will be a PGY-1 resident at Kaiser Permanente in Sacramento, her hometown. She will specialize in ambulatory care at an outpatient anticoagulation clinic. “During rotations in school I loved the one-on-one contact with patients. I felt ambulatory care was closest to being able to do that on a daily basis.”

Michael Motto will be a pharmacist-liaison for Mega Aid Compounding Pharmacy, a custom pharmacy based in Brooklyn that creates personalized medications tailored to patients’ specific needs. They focus heavily on medications absorbed through the skin and operate as a behind-the-scenes laboratory for other retail pharmacies.

“My job is to rotate to sites and educate doctors and other interested parties and explain the products we offer and why they may or may not be better than the products they’re already using,” he said. “I’ve always been interested in an industry role and see this as a good first step to where I want to end up, which is as a medical director at a major pharmaceutical company.”