Coronavirus sees medics at UCL graduate remotely wearing unusual outfits – including a kitten as a hat

Final year medics at UCL, some of whom are already helping tackle the coronavirus at hospitals like the Royal Free, celebrated graduating last week with a unique online ceremony.

Final year UCL medics had a Zoom graduation. Picture: UCL - Credit: Archant

All 303 of the university’s graduating doctors were invited to a Zoom ceremony and told to improvise some form of hat.

They were then called forward in groups to appear on Zoom’s “gallery view” and doff said headwear, which for one enterprising student was a small kitten.

Sophie Bracke, who is volunteering at the Royal Free during the crisis, graduated with kitten Mistie on her head.

She said: “Although a virtual graduation is not what I had imagined several months ago, it was a lovely and inventive gesture from the medical school, and a great reminder that although the end of medical school has turned out differently than planned, I still got the outcome I have always dreamed of - to become a doctor!”

Meanwhile, Megan Hollands, who is already working at the Royal Free as a doctor, was wearing an unusual outfit: “I celebrated by sitting outside my flat with some Prosecco, wearing a bin bag.”