The valedictorian of the Class of 2025 is Peter Gorman. Peter is a graduate of the Dual BA Program between Trinity College Dublin and Columbia University, studying biological and biomedical sciences at Trinity and neuroscience at Columbia.
A Dublin native, Peter was the third Dual BA Program student to be named a Trinity Foundation Scholar—a highly competitive designation earned through a series of voluntary exams, and conferring upon Scholars a generous educational stipend and entrance into the centuries-old Trinity Scholars community. At Trinity, Peter was also a research assistant at the Global Brain Health Institute, where he served as a project coordinator for PREVENT Dublin, a multinational study examining origins and early diagnosis of Alzheimer’s Disease in a cohort of high-risk, mid-life patients.
Peter continued his research endeavors at Columbia as a research assistant at the Zuckerman Mind Brain Behavior Institute. He was named a Bancroft Research Scholar in Spring 2024—Bancroft Scholars receive funding and support to engage, alongside faculty members, in meaningful research during the academic year—for a project which aimed to understand how short term stress can contribute to longer-term health and wellness. This project, carried out jointly in the labs of Dr. Andrés Bendesky and Dr. Rui Costa, also earned him the Bridges and Sturtevant Prize for a “highly original and fruitful” thesis in the Biological Sciences.
Peter graduates summa cum laude with a degree in neuroscience and behavior, and is a member of Phi Beta Kappa and the GS Honor Society. After graduation, he will begin his DPhil in neuroscience at the University of Oxford. Alongside his graduating class, Peter’s time at Columbia has been shaped by the University’s response to peaceful student protest. He remains mindful of the mutual responsibilities of science and society, and commends his classmates in their efforts to pursue a more just world.
*Article updated late May 2025 with image from the GS Class Day Ceremony, held on Monday, May 19, 2025.
