Commencement

I walked across the stage two weeks ago today, graduation gown billowing and tassel smoking in the heat.  President Fox shook my hand, lots of people I don’t know snapped photos, and I became one of those driven, successful people who graduate college in four years.  Except that I haven’t graduated in four years.

My maroon diploma with its St. Lawrence crest reads “congratulations on your effort.”  The semester I took off junior year, according to our Office of Institutional Research, throws me out of the federally-defined “cohort” of students who enrolled in fall 2008 and will graduate by this summer.  My nonconsecutive eight semesters of undergrad is like a magic key to the 5-year graduation club.

We could not have asked for a more beautiful day for the Class of 2012 Commencement Ceremony. It was 85 degrees and not a cloud in the sky! While I enjoyed the ceremony in the shade of the large, leafy trees over Creasy Commons, I think the graduates would have appreciated a cloud or two, or at least a breeze to cut the heat.


Photo provided by Tara Freeman, University Photographer.

Earlier in the week I posted a blog on how to contribute to the behind the scenes chatter leading up to graduation, at the event itself, and the final thoughts of seniors as they leave campus not as students, but as alumni of St. Lawrence University by using twitter.  To contribute to the conversation all you have to do is use the hashtag #SLUgrad2011 at the end of your tweets.

So your friend or family member is graduating from SLU this upcoming Sunday.  If you are on campus or far away you can join the discussion about commencement while the event is going on.  How might you ask?  Simple, twitter.