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21 Moments from 2021

A look back at the year through our lens

By Duke University

January 7^th, 2022

On January 19, four-hundred luminarias were lit and the Duke Chapel bell rang 40 times in tribute to the approximately 400,000 lives lost to COVID-19 at that time.

An aerial photo of West Campus down Chapel Drive.

A dusting of snow blanketed Duke and Durham on January 28.

Pediatric cardiologist Piers Barker meets with heart patient Josie Dunnigan to review her echocardiogram in the Duke Children's Health Center. Barker used a 3D printed model of Dunnigan's heart to aid in her recent surgery.

Chip Bobbert, Co-Lab digital fabrication architect and senior analyst, and Cardiac sonographer Gregory Sturgeon review a 3D model of a patient’s heart that Duke’s Innovation CoLab will 3D print to help Duke cardiac surgeons prepare for surgery.

A life-size, 3D printed model of a patient’s heart created at the Duke Innovation Co-Lab.

A remarkable partnership between Duke Children’s Hospital and the Duke Innovation Co-Lab has allowed doctors to physically inspect the intricacies of a patient’s heart using a model generated from non-invasive imaging techniques.

A student self-administers a nasal swab at the testing site in the Levine Science Research Center (LSRC) on Duke's West Campus.

Students, faculty and staff participated in testing and symptom monitoring using phone apps developed at Duke.

Janet Challacombe, an administer in the Duke Human Vaccine Institute, preps COVID-19 test tubes so they can be delivered to surveillance testing sites on campus.

Dillon Haggins, a Duke contractor, loads administered COVID-19 tests into a cold storage room for processing at the Sands Research Building.

Duke implemented an immense testing effort to keep our community safe from COVID-19 both on and off campus. From setting up testing sites, to creating symptom monitoring apps, diligently self-administering tests and processing them in the lab, it was the herculean effort of a Duke United that allowed us to return to in-person learning in 2021.

Two students walk beneath the falling blossoms in the Spring.

The Sarah P. Duke Gardens began a phased reopening in Spring 2021 which meant students were once again able to walk beneath the falling blossoms from the Cherry trees.

An aerial photo shows the expansive Duke Forest adjacent to Duke University’s West Campus.

The Duke Forest celebrated its 90th anniversary making it the university’s biggest and oldest outdoor classroom and living laboratory.

First year students, from left, Brandon Lopez, Lara Breithaupt and Emma Chun, practice on the Duke Chapel steps during a sunny spring evening.

Duke students found new places to perform and creative ways to connect on campus to continue learning and growing while helping to keep the community safe.

John Legend stands at the podium, addressing 2021 graduates.

Multiplatinum-selling singer-songwriter, actor, producer and philanthropist John Legend addressed the 2021 graduates at Duke’s commencement ceremony, in-person, at Wallace Wade Stadium this May.

John Scheyer addressing the Class of 2025 at their Class Photo Moment during orientation week.

At the beginning of June, Coach K announced that the 2021-22 season would be his final year of coaching. Shortly afterwards, John Scheyer was named the next head coach of Duke Men’s Basketball.

President Price addressed first-year students during convocation on Abele Quad, marking the return of the tradition that welcomes the Duke community to the new academic year.

Students returned to in-person learning in classrooms where masks were required.

Students returned to classroom of all sorts, taking the necessary precautions to keep each other healthy and safe.

At a special convocation ceremony on Abele Quad at the beginning of the fall semester, President Price celebrated renewed academic life on campus as students returned to classrooms taking the necessary precautions to make in-person learning and collaboration work during a world-wide pandemic.

First-year students celebrate with new friends.

Confetti rained down on the Class of 2025 during their class photo in celebration of their arrival on campus at Duke.

Members of the Class of 2025 assemble for the iconic class photo.

The Class Photo Moment returned this year for the Class of 2025 on east campus. The class congregated during orientation to take this photo marking one of the few times they will all be together until they graduate in 2025.

The Blue Devils Return, a celebration complete with confetti, carnival and fireworks, welcomed students back to an energetic campus this Fall.

Members of the Class of 2024 line up for their class photo in front of Duke Chapel.

The Class of 2024 made up for their missed class photo moment in 2020 with a unique and memorable photo shoot in front of Duke Chapel this fall.

Faulkner Fox, lecturing fellow of English, leads her class, “Introduction to Playwriting: Plays that Change the World,” on the Chapel steps during a beautiful Fall evening.

A Writing 101 class, “It's a Bug’s World,” lead by Sarah Parsons, went on a field trip to forage for insects in an old Durham baseball field near central campus.

The Civil & Environmental Engineering (CEE) 463L class explores how water flows at the American Tobacco Campus in Durham.

Leonard White, Associate Professor in Neurology, teaches undergraduates in the lab portion of his class, NEUROSCI 380L: The Functional Anatomy of the Human Brain, in the DIBS (Duke Institute for Brain Sciences) “Cube.”

Students run through a dress rehearsal for the Theatre Studies Mainstage production of Golem at Bryan Center Sheafer Theatre.

Engineering students work in teams on a semester-long project together to identify hundreds of rainforest species, as part of the XPRIZE Rainforest competition, during their Ocean Engineering course, taught by Prof. Martin Brooke in the Foundry.

Students returning to the familiar experience of in-person learning but also found that the traditional classroom experience had been reshaped by opportunities created by both the pandemic and remote learning.

Eva Naumann, assistant professor of neurobiology, comes into focus behind tanks of the translucent zebrafish she studies.

Eva Naumann, assistant professor of neurobiology, studies the genetically accessible, translucent zebrafish to map, monitor and manipulate neuronal activity to help better understand simple behaviors in human brains.

An archival photo of Wilhelmina Reuben-Cooke

The dedicaton ceremony for the Wilhelmina Reuben-Cooke building on September 24.

Duke University held a dedication ceremony officially renaming the Sociology-Psychology Building on West Campus for the late Wilhelmina Reuben-Cooke, ’67, one of the “First Five” Black undergraduates at Duke. Reuben-Cooke went on to an extraordinary career in law, academics, and civic engagement.

Ken Jeong holds his hands over his heart as he entered the 2020 commencement ceremony with faculty and President Price.

Actor, comedian and Duke alum, Ken Jeong was finally able to deliver the 2020 commencement address in-person, on Abele Quad this Fall more than a year after the celebration of 2020 graduates was postponed due to COVID-19.

Red, orange and gold wrap the gothic architecture of the West Campus quads.

As students settled back in to classes, fall color returned to campus covering tree-lined quads in hues of red, yellow and gold.

The Color Guard stands at the front of this year’s Veterans Day ceremony.

Duke’s annual Veterans Day ceremony returned to campus this year to honor those who have served in the U.S. armed forces. Last year’s ceremony was held online due to the pandemic.

This year, Duke welcomed more than 100 scholars in a new class of Faculty that cover a wide range of disciplines and also reflect the university’s commitment to hiring for inclusive excellence and advancing and expanding Duke’s teaching and scholarship related to social and racial equity.

The Pitchforks and Out of the Blue joined together on the steps in front of the clocktower to sing “Let it Snow.”

To cap off the year, a cappella groups Pitchforks and Out of the Blue united to create a very special performance of “Let it Snow” to spread holiday cheer to the Duke community.