Utah State University is gearing up for its 138th commencement ceremony set to take place this week, marking the milestone achievement of 7,185 students who are slated to earn degrees this year. As reported by USU Today, the event will commence at 7 p.m. on April 30 in the Dee Glen Smith Spectrum in Logan, followed by college convocations and hooding ceremonies continuing through May 1 and 2. Recognizing the fruits of academic labor, no tickets are necessary for those wishing to attend the Logan campus commencement and its related convocations, offering open doors to families and friends.
Commencement speaker M. William “Willy” Lensch, both a USU alumnus and Harvard’s associate provost for research, alongside Kem C. Gardner, a noted real estate developer and philanthropist, will be awarded honorary degrees during the ceremony. According to USU Today, the two are distinguished by their respective contributions to education and the community at large.
The sheer diversity of the student body is on display in the preliminary graduation data, with USU conferring a wide range of degrees from 576 undergraduate certificates to 162 doctorates. Among these are 49 graduates from foreign countries, with China leading at 84 students, and military commissions including 14 for the U.S. Air Force and 8 for the Army, 3 of whom are recognized as Distinguished Military Graduates. Accomplishments stretch across generations, with the oldest graduates born in 1953 and the youngest in 2007, highlighting that education indeed knows no age.
In this year's ranking of popularity among degrees, economics topped undergraduate lists with 356 degrees, while the Master of Business Administration led with 132 at the graduate level. It is demarcated by USU Today that a significant number of first-generation students, a total of 1,197, will be graduating across degree levels, illustrating the university's role in fostering upward mobility.
A slew of academic recognitions, such as the D. Wynne Thorne Career Research Award and the Eldon J. Gardner Teaching Award, spotlight the hard work and dedication of USU's faculty. This year’s recipients, as shared by USU Today, include Michael Twohig for research excellence in Education & Human Services and Andrew Brim for his achievements in business education. Underscoring their commitment to teaching, additional faculty members from various colleges are set to receive Teaching Excellence Awards.
