Utah State's Fall Commencement is Dec. 17

Approximately 550
UtahStateUniversity students will participate in the university's Fall Commencement exercise Saturday, Dec. 17, at 10:30 a.m. in the Dee Glen Smith Spectrum. The 114th commencement will feature a joint ceremony for both undergraduate and graduate students.

As part of the event, Utah State Board of Regents Chair Nolan Karras will oversee a brief ceremony for the official investiture of Stan L. Albrecht as the university’s 15th president.

Highly honored Utah State Professor Sonia Manuel-Dupont will deliver the commencement address, and President Albrecht will moderate the ceremony, which once again will feature a student commencement speaker. Students will assemble in theNelsonRecreationCenter before 9:30 a.m. for the traditional march to the Spectrum for the main activities.

Included among the graduating class of seniors will be approximately 121 master’s students and 13 Ph.D. students.

All students’ names will be formally announced as they walk across the stage. Sydney Peterson, chair of the Commencement Committee, said this change was highly successful in the Fall 2004 ceremony and is among many in a continuing effort to make the ceremony more student-centered. This year’s student commencement speaker is Brooke Sorenson, valedictorian from theCollege ofEducation , who will deliver remarks to the graduating class. Sorenson was selected by a committee of other valedictorians from among the pool of valedictorians from each of the colleges.

Graduates must pick up a Processional Card at the Registrar’s Office. The Processional Card includes each graduate’s name and a number that will put them in the correct line-up order. All students, both undergraduate and graduate, will line up in theNelsonRecreationCenter with their colleges no later than 9:30 a.m. Students must bring the Processional Card, which will be handed to the reader at the graduation ceremony.

Anyone who still needs to purchase a cap and gown can now do so only on the morning of Dec. 17. Those needing either Processional Cards or academic regalia should arrive at the Fieldhouse by 9 a.m. Visit the commencement Web site for prices of caps and gowns.

Tickets are not required for the commencement ceremony. Seating is available in the Spectrum on a first-come, first-served basis. The doors open at 9:30 a.m.

The procession from the Fieldhouse to the Spectrum begins at 10 a.m., and the commencement ceremony begins at 10:30 a.m.

The university also will sponsor a "University Celebration" for graduates and guests immediately following the ceremony in theTaggartStudentCenter . The various colleges will congregate in the Stevenson Ballroom on the second floor of the student center, where graduates will have the chance to introduce their families and friends to their professors and colleagues.

This year’s commencement speaker, Dr. Manuel-Dupont, is a well-loved associate professor of Communicative Disorders and Deaf Education, Civil and Environmental Engineering and English atUtahState .

She received the Carnegie Foundation’s CASE Teacher of the Year award asUtah ’s best professor in 1997. Prior to this award, she was designated Teacher of the Year for theCollege ofEducation in 1989 and 1992, and she received the Eldon J. Gardner Award for Excellence in Teaching for USU in 1992. She was the university’s first Honor’s Professor in 1988, and she has been named Departmental Teacher of the Year eight times. The Utah State Mortar Board Senior Honor Society has named her Top Prof 12 times. In 1994 she received the USU Diversity Award in Teaching, and in 2004 the USU Institute of Religion honored her as an Outstanding Teacher. 

She has joint appointments in Communicative Disorders and Deaf Education (COMDDE) where she teaches classes in Phonology, Language Science and Assessment of the Bilingual Child; in Civil and Environmental Engineering where she teaches Technical and Professional Writing, and Effective Engineering Instruction; and in English where she teaches Linguistics and Ethnic Literacy. She is also an active Extension teacher, driving to Roosevelt one semester a year to teach classes in English to Education majors, and in the Outreach Master’s Program for COMDDE, where she offers intensive instruction each summer to Speech Language Pathology graduate students. In addition, she is the graduate advisor in COMDDE and the faculty advisor for the student group. 

Manuel-Dupont was selected from among a list of outstanding professors on campus, according to Peterson. She said the president wanted the fall commencement to have a different flavor than the spring graduation ceremony, so the commencement committee looked within the institution for a person who could capture the essence of students’ experiences and who also could send them forth with a message of merit.