As she began her remarks that opened this year’s Donor Remembrance Ceremony, Amy Gyorkos, PhD, spoke of gratitude and generosity and how donors, through their selfless gift to the medical school, “are among the most important teachers our students will encounter.”
“Your loved ones made a choice of remarkable generosity, one that will leave a lasting imprint on not only our medical school but on the countless patients our students will one day care for,” Dr. Gyorkos said. “In our anatomy program, your loved ones are among the most important teachers our students will encounter, guiding them through lessons no book could teach them. Lessons about the human body but also about the beauty, the fragility, and the gift of human life.
“Through their generosity, students learn humility, they learn empathy and respect in ways that shape not only their understanding of medicine but the kinds of physicians and people that they hope to become.”
MORE: 100+ photos from the Donor Remembrance Ceremony
Dr. Gyorkos was among several WMed students, faculty, and staff, who spoke during the Donor Remembrance Ceremony that was held on Sunday, October 12, 2025, at the medical school’s W.E. Upjohn M.D. Campus.
Friends and family, as well as members of the community, gathered in the William D. Johnston and Ronda E. Stryker Auditorium for the event, which honored 27 Body Donation Program donors.
Second-year medical students Jackson Goudreau, Joseph Tomecki, and Megan Westphal honored donors and their families during the event with the reading of poetry and performances.
Westphal, a competitive figure skater, performed a routine inside Lawson Ice Arena at Western Michigan University with music from Bruno Mars. A recording of the performance was played during the Donor Remembrance Ceremony. Gourdreau, a champion drum major, performed a routine with his drum major mace baton on the auditorium stage backed by music from Hans Zimmer.
Tomecki, meanwhile, read a reflection from a graduate from the WMed Class of 2022 that he said “still holds true to our class today.”
“So I wonder no longer why you gave what you gave,” Tomecki said as he recited the reflection. “Rather I ponder the ways you’ve helped me that one day I may save.
Inspired me with your courageous charity.”
After Tomecki, those gathered in the auditorium for the ceremony were treated to a performance of “Ave Maria” by Julie VanGyseghem, PhD, an instructor in the Department of Biomedical Sciences, and Dr. Vangyseghem’s son.
Dr. VanGyseghem, who played the violin while her son accompanied her on the piano, told the crowd that her grandmother, who helped instill a love of music in her life, was also a body donor at another institution.
“I wanted to share my family’s gift of music,” Dr. VanGyseghem said.
After the performances, the names of each of the 27 donors were read aloud by M2s Nayana Bhatnagar and Mackenzie Simon and the eight donors who served in the U.S. military were honored with the playing of “Taps.”
“The individuals we honor today made an incredible act of generosity, one that transcends and will continue to shape our medical education,” Bhatnagar said. “Their legacy is one of knowledge, respect, and service. We honor them and we thank you, the families.”
Each of the 27 donors who were honored at this year’s Donor Remembrance Ceremony will be represented by a glass leaf that will be added to the Body Donor Memorial Tree at the W.E. Upjohn M.D. Campus. Each unique piece of glass is engraved with the name of the donor and serves as a constant reminder of the individual’s selfless gift to advance medical education. The Body Donor Memorial Tree commemorates all who have made donations to the Body Donation Program at WMed since the program’s inception in 2014.
“Our donors, your loved ones, are the ultimate servants to their community,” said Christine Pink, PhD, assistant professor in the Department of Pathology, who serves as director of the Body Donation Program. “These students of medicine will go on to become practicing physicians in part because of the priceless gift our donors have given to WMed. I am humbled and honored every single day that I come through the doors by the gift of your family members, your loved ones, and by the responsibility I owe them. I really only hope that I, and we, can live up to their legacies.”
As the Donor Remembrance Ceremony concluded, Dr. Pink read the poem “Remember Me” by Margaret Mead, a renowned anthropologist who for years studied cultures in Southeast Asia and the South Pacific.
“To the living, I am gone,
To the sorrowful, I will never return,
To the angry, I was cheated,
But to the happy, I am at peace,
And to the faithful, I have never left.
I cannot speak, but I can listen.
I cannot be seen, but I can be heard.
So as you stand upon a shore gazing at a beautiful sea,
As you look upon a flower and admire its simplicity,
Remember me.
Remember me in your heart:
Your thoughts, and your memories,
Of the times we loved,
The times we cried,
The times we fought,
The times we laughed.
For if you always think of me, I will never have gone.”