USU Schedules Annual Commencement Activities

A few significant changes mark Utah State University’s  115th undergraduate commencement ceremony Saturday, May 6, in the Dee Glen Smith Spectrum. The university has returned to a general morning commencement format followed by individual college ceremonies throughout the day.

The graduate student commencement ceremony is Friday, May 5, in the Dee Glen Smith Spectrum at 1:30 p.m. Candidates will assemble at 12:30 p.m. in the Nelson Fieldhouse, and the academic procession to the Smith Spectrum begins at 1 p.m.

 

The traditional graduation march for undergraduates begins at 9 a.m. Saturday from the Quad and continues to the Smith Spectrum, where the ceremony begins at 9:30 a.m. (see complete schedule at www.usu.edu/commencement). Students and faculty should assemble on the Quad at 8:30 a.m., and participants who will be on stage should assemble in the Taggart Student Center.

 

President Stan Albrecht will moderate the ceremony, which for the fourth year in a row will feature a student commencement speaker. The morning ceremony will include a commencement address by C. Peter Magrath and the conferring of honorary degrees. Students will receive their diplomas, have their names read and walk across the stage at their individual college ceremonies, which follow the morning ceremony at various locations on campus.

 

Ben Searle, valedictorian for the College of Engineering, will deliver remarks to the graduating class. Searle was selected by a committee of other valedictorians from among the pool of valedictorians from each of the colleges.

 

Commencement speaker Magrath is immediate past-president of NASULGC, National Association of State Universities and Land-Grant Colleges from 1992 through 2005. NASULGC is the nation’s oldest higher education association, and as CEO he represented 215 public research universities on issues of importance to the higher education community. He is past president of three universities and will bring a broad perspective on higher education issues, including a long history of leadership in international education activities. He has great knowledge of the issues confronting the higher education community in the nation.

 

Approximately 2,511 students will receive bachelor’s degrees Saturday. Approximately 325 master’s degrees will be awarded, and 30 students will receive doctorate degrees at the graduate ceremony Friday.

 

The university also will bestow a number of other honors during the commencement, including:

Honorary Degrees (short biographical info below at bottom of page):

 

-- C. Peter Magrath (also Commencement speaker)

-- Manon Russell

-- Lorenzo “Ren” Hoopes

 

D. Wynne Thorne Research Award: DeeVon Bailey, College of Agriculture

 

Outstanding Graduate Mentor Award: Edmund D. “Butch” Brodie, Jr.

 

E.G. Peterson Extension Award: Verl Bagley

 

Eldon J. Gardner Teaching Award: Leigh Monhardt, College of Education and Human Services

 

Teaching Excellence Awards:

 

-- College of Ag - Rhonda Miller

-- College of Business - Cindy Durtschi

-- College of Education and Human Services - Leigh Monhardt

-- College of Engineering - Gary Green

-- College of HASS - Brock Dethier

-- College of Natural Resources - John C. Malechek

-- College of Science - Gregory Podgorski

 

Department Teaching Excellence Award:

Languages, Philosophy, and Speech Communication department

 

Student Commencement Speaker: Ben Searle, College of Engineering valedictorian

 

Honorary Degree recipient bio sketches:

 

C. Peter Magrath: Immediate past-president of NASULGC, National Association of State Universities and Land-Grant Colleges from 1992 through 2005. (This is the nation’s oldest higher education association, and as CEO he represented 215 public research universities on issues of importance to the higher education community. He was past president of three universities, and brings a broad perspective on higher education issues, including a long history of leadership in international education activities. He is an extremely dynamic speaker with great knowledge of the issues confronting the higher education community in the nation.

Lorenzo (Ren) Hoopes: long and successful career in business and in the civic arena. He held many senior leadership positions with Safeway Stores, which was the world’s largest food retailer. He also served as Executive assistant to U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Ezra Taft Benson. He served in dozens of boards and advisory councils, including 17 years as director of the board of education for the Oakland Unified School District, 20 years as a director of the National Dairy Council, and more than 40 years as a director of the Foundation for American Agriculture.

 

Manon Caine Russell: has made a life-long commitment to supporting dozens and dozens of charitable causes in Utah. Along with her sister, Kathryn Caine Wanlass, Manon Caine Russell’s name is associated with Utah State University’s world-class performance hall, the signature building for the university’s Caine School of the Arts. She is a member of northern Utah’s preeminent foundation, the Marie Eccles Caine Foundation, which has supported countless organizations in Cache and Box Elder counties, including the Brigham City Museum-Gallery, Cache Children’s Choir and Cache Valley Center for the Arts, the Chamber Music Society of Logan and Musica Reservata. The foundation supports the Stokes Nature Center, the Utah Festival Opera, the Caine Lyric Theatre, Sunshine Terrace, the Unicorn Theatre, Ballet West, KUED-TV, Ririe-Woodbury Dance Company, the Utah Symphony and Opera, to name just a handful. In addition, the organization has supported USU programs in the music department, Utah Public Radio, the Merrill Library, the theatre department, Women’s Center, the interior design department, the Nora Eccles Harrison Museum of Art and many, many more. She is a board member for the Cache Valley Center for the Arts and the Nora Eccles Harrison Art Museum, and she is also on the Dean’s Advancement Council for the College of HASS.