Posted May 1, 2023
The University of Wisconsin-River Falls spring commencement ceremony will be held on Saturday, May 6, in Knowles Fieldhouse at the Falcon Center.
There will be two ceremonies at 9 a.m. and 1 p.m. The 9 a.m. ceremony is for all undergraduates in the College of Agriculture, Food and Environmental Sciences; the College of Business and Economics; and graduate students.
The 1 p.m. ceremony will be for the College of Arts and Sciences, and the College of Education and Professional Studies.
According to Event Coordinator Mesa Carlsen, the reason for the two ceremonies is to “balance things out.”
“The two ceremonies really just divide out the colleges to make sure everybody fits,” Carlsen said. “We want to make sure everybody has an equal timeframe.”
Carlsen said that the ceremonies will last between an hour and a half and an hour and 45 minutes.
“That’s just a rough estimate,” Carlsen said. “It all depends on how long the speeches take, the hooding of the graduates, and other factors as well.”
The student speaker at this spring’s graduation will be Brigitte Ledferd. According to Carlsen, Ledferd was selected from a committee of students.
Also speaking at the ceremony will be Larry McKenzie, who is known for being the first coach to win four straight state titles in the 100-year history of Minnesota basketball.
“Not only is McKenzie a fantastic coach, but he’s also a UWRF alum as well,” Carlsen said. “We’re excited to have him back on campus.”
Carlsen also emphasized that the graduation ceremonies could not occur without the help of student employees.
“We couldn’t have a successful commencement without student employees,” Carlsen said. “Student employees are a huge part of the preparation of the ceremony.”
Carlsen added that there are all sorts of student employees who clean out the Falcon Center from “top to bottom” in order to ensure a successful commencement.
Additional information about the spring commencement can be found on the UWRF commencement website, uwrf.edu/commencement.
The article may be found online at https://uwrfjournalism.org/2023/05/uwrf-spring-commencement/.