To all our students and alumni who have ever called IADS home,

Seventy-five years ago, a small group of dental students believed something simple and stubborn: that no one should have to walk the long road of this profession alone. They had no headquarters, no budget worth mentioning, and no guarantee anyone would still be listening decades later. What they had was a conviction that students across borders were stronger together than apart. From that conviction, IADS was born. This year, we carry that belief to Prague.

When I look at where we stand today, I do not see an institution. I see faces. The student who arrived at their first congress knowing no one and left with friends across the world. The volunteer who answered emails at midnight because they believed the work mattered. The alumni who went on to build clinics, lead faculties, and shape policy, yet never forgot the room where it all began. Every one of you is the reason this organization is still standing, still growing, still ours.

Seventy-five years is not a number. It is a relay, hands passing something precious from one generation to the next. The students who founded IADS are the first runners in a race we are still running, and in Prague we run it together.

Beneath everything, IADS has always been one thing above the rest: the place that unites us. That is what we built. That is what we protect. So come to Prague, and remember that wherever your career takes you, there is a place that will always welcome you back.
For seventy-five years, IADS has been that place. It always will be.

 

With gratitude and pride,

Abdullah Munqith Al-Zubaidi