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COURIER photo/Gabriel Fenoy
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| Workers put up a stage in front of Bridges Auditorium yesterday on the Pomona College campus in preparation for this weekend’s commencement ceremony. All five colleges, as well as Claremont Graduate University and Keck Graduate Institute, will hold ceremonies this weekend. |
Commencement season culminates in weekend of graduation ceremonies
The middle of May means one thing for students of the Claremont Colleges who are nearing graduation—commencement. And for those who are looking toward the day with great anticipation, they will get their wish this weekend.
Pomona College, Scripps College, Claremont McKenna College, Pitzer College, Harvey Mudd College, Claremont Graduate University and the Keck Graduate Institute of Applied Life Sciences will all be holding commencement ceremonies this weekend as the graduating classes of 2008 complete their academic tenures and move on to greater ambitions.
One of the traditions that will be upheld at the different commencement events is the tradition of having a student speaker address the graduating class. For Pomona College, senior Kyle Edgerton will be standing in front of his peers and deliver a speech this Sunday morning.
“It’s an honor to be recognized by my classmates as being interesting enough to deliver a speech that they want to hear,” the philosophy/politics/economics interdisciplinary major said. “It is very flattering to be the one chosen out of the 400 brilliant minds that make up my senior class.”
The oldest of the Claremont Colleges, Pomona College will hold its 115th Commencement Ceremony on Sunday morning at 10 in the school’s Marston Quad. Oscar and Emmy award-winning film producer and director Alex Gibney—who won the 2008 Academy Award for Taxi to the Dark Side—will deliver the keynote address.
Other commencement ceremonies taking place on Sunday include Scripps College at 10 a.m. on Elm Tree Lawn with student speaker Ashley Peters and acclaimed screenwriter/poet Kirsten Smith giving the keynote speech while at 1:30 p.m. in the Mudd Quadrangle, Harvey Mudd College keynote speaker Bill Nye (host of Emmy award-winning television program Bill Nye the Science Guy) and student speaker Marielle Wardell will highlight Harvey Mudd’s 50th commencement event.
“I found out that I was selected about a couple of weeks ago,” said Ms. Wardell, who is a math major. “When I auditioned, I never expected to be picked but it’s exciting and I’m pretty happy about it. These years went faster than I thought they would go.”
Saturday’s commencement ceremonies kick off with Keck Graduate Institute and Claremont Graduate University at 11 a.m. KGI’s 7th Annual Commencement will take place on the campus’ East Lawn with KGI President Sheldon Schuster delivering the keynote address while CGU’s 81st Annual Commencement will feature renowned mathematician Richard Tapia as the keynote speaker and Terry Crandall as the student speaker.
KGI’s commencement will also include its very first PhD graduate, Eric Tan, who earned a Masters of Bioscience (MBS) degree from the same school in 2004. While KGI’s PhD program now contains a full group of students, Mr. Tan was the first student to enter KGI’s new PhD program in Applied Life Sciences.
“I decided to volunteer for it because the traditional PhD programs at most large universities have students conducting research on a specific aspect of science but not industry science,” Mr. Tan explained. “For me, the PhD program needs to be something that is applied, where you can investigate and attain knowledge of other aspects of science. It has to be interdisciplinary. It’s been a huge honor being part of the PhD program at KGI.”
For Mr. Tan’s dissertation on “Isothermal DNA Amplification and Visual Detection for Point of Care Nucleic Acid Detection,” he conducted research that contributed to an ongoing project by KGI faculty to develop a hand-held medical device for rapid detection of human pathogens. Tan’s faculty advisor, Angelika Niemz, views the first KGI PhD graduate as more than deserving of the honor.
“It’s been a great overall experience and Eric is certainly worthy of being the first PhD graduate of KGI,” Ms. Niemz said. “This has been really great because it’s something that you go through as a new experience and it is neat to see it all come together.”
Pitzer College will hold its 44th Annual Commencement on the Brant Clock Tower Lawn at 1 p.m. on Saturday with Pulitzer Prize winning author/journalist Samantha Power being the event’s keynote speaker and Student Senate President Ben Kramer as the student speaker. Claremont McKenna College’s 61st Annual Commencement follows at 2 p.m. on Pritzlaff Field with CMC trustee and Mayor of Dallas Tom Leppert set to deliver the keynote address.
CMC Vice President for Student Affairs Jeff Huang views Mayor Leppert’s address as one that will have a significant impact on the graduating class.
“Tom was resolute in his bid for the mayoral race in Dallas,” said Mr. Huang in a released statement. “He’s very intelligent and level-headed, but what surprises me about Tom is his modesty. I think he will bring great perspective about the dynamics between his personal, professional and political aspirations.”
—Landus Rigsby
