A thank you letter from CEU UCH Valedictorians

Professor Salvatore Sauro contacted us this week to ask us a little favour. He normally does so when there is an important event going on at the Dental Clinic, or he wants to inform us about something worthy to be published on our blog. However, this time it was something different, something that caught us by surprise: a letter from two students, and a very nice one. Would we publish it on our blog? Of course!!!

Atanaz Darvizeh and Ali Abedi-Amin, last-year students of Dentistry (or should we say “graduates”?), got the highest possible grade in their final project and they wanted to share their joy with the university. Here you have the letter they have sent us:

Back in January, after successfully completing the first semester of 5th year, we were faced with the pinnacle of our professional career at CEU-UCH. It was not the pressure of having to wake up 6 am Monday morning after a relaxing weekend, or the journeys that took us back and forth to the university even for a couple of hours, but to face the final year project (TFG: Trabajo Fin de Grado) daunted on us.

We had worked so hard to get to where we were and academically all our grades were in top ranking of our class; yet envisioning such “thesis project or TFG” was likely to be our biggest challenge so far. Due to our successful academic background, our 1st choice supervisor was elected amongst many other professors and we had the pleasure of working with Dr. Arlinda Luzi. In our initial meeting, we had a brief discussion about our topic of choice like endodontics, implantology, microscopy but something did not feel quite right. Something was missing. Having discussed our concern, we put our heads together and decided to collaborate with Professor Salvatore Sauro to perform an experimental work for our TFG.

Dr. Salvatore Sauro and Dr. Arlinda Luzi in CEU Cardenal Herrera University Dental Clínic

In fact it was destined to work perfectly. Salvatore was enthusiastic and accommodating right from the start, and was looking for motivation, something we both inherently possess. After two hours long discussion with Salvatore, our topics were chosen and work was going to get started. We knew it would not be easy, but we had no idea what we go ourselves in for.

 

Next day, Salvatore call us into their office. Materials almost ready, some on their way to Valencia. Study design is set. Time for us to shine and show what we are made of. Came out the calendars and organisation skills as well as pure determination so eager to get the work under way. Spreadsheets, documents and materials were continuously flying in and around us anticipating data collection which would later prove to be of great value.

For the next 5 months, we were eating and breathing TFG. Probably dreamt about it too! It wasn’t too long before we noticed how important it is to have fantastic guides around you. Everytime there was a disruption in our work, Salvatore would intervene and adjust. It was crucial because you need hope, inspiration, and enthusiasm from all involved to get work done. But his tremendous experience and background in our chosen fields were a blessing that allowed us to continue. It was as if we are learning to walk again with someone holding your hand and within minutes you are running on your own. This independence allowed us to work consistently and professionally throughout. Whenever we had doubts, Salvatore would assist and readjust if necessary.

A great work is never done alone, and we truly enjoyed having this fantastic relationship with Salvatore who pushed our drive to complete this tremendous work. His invaluable and rich insights in dental biomaterials have been so encouraging that more work has resulted from one experiment. In fact, both our works will be presented in American Dental Materials, a well-known international dentistry journal. Exciting times as these works will be also published in a high impact factor dental journal known as Dental Materials!

When we found out that our work had been selected as the highest grade amongst 100 other students, we could not contain ourselves. A distinction in a final project for having the right person with you all throughout. Thank you Professor Sauro Salvatore for making this possible, we hope to remain close associates and collaborators for many years to come in field of dental biomaterials and with your help, excel beyond what we think is possible with more experiments and discoveries at CEU UCH. You have shown us the way and our attention has been diverted, our key skills discovered and our presentation skills tested resulting in a fantastic achievement.

Atanaz Darvizeh and Ali Abedi-Amin

What can we say? These things make us feel happy and proud of our students…imagine the smile in the faces of Professors Salvatore Sauro and Arlinda Luzi!

 

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