Event Kicks Off Campus's Anniversary Celebrating "Forty Years of Innovation"

UC Irvine expects to confer a record number of degrees at its 40th annual commencement exercises June 18 and 19. The graduation marks the beginning of an anniversary celebration themed "Forty Years of Innovation" that will continue into the coming academic year.

Academic degrees to be awarded at the commencement ceremonies include 5,125 bachelor's degrees, 982 master's degrees and 255 doctoral degrees. The School of Medicine awarded medical doctorates to 87 students at a June 4 ceremony, bringing the total number of degrees earned by the class of 2005 to 6,449.

Of students graduating with academic honors, 53 will graduate summa cum laude, 166 magna cum laude and 409 cum laude. Awards and scholarships for academic excellence will be given to 381 students; these awards include the Dean's Academic Achievement Award, the Order of Merit Award and ArtsBridge scholarships. Many of the students receiving honors will participate in a special Honors Convocation at 7:30 p.m. Friday, June 17, at the Bren Events Center.

At its first commencement exercises in June 1966, UCI granted just 10 bachelor's, three master's and one doctoral degree. The campus will commemorate its four decades of growth and contributions beginning with the 40th graduation and continuing through the fall quarter. Among the highlights will be a Nov. 3 public symposium and exhibit, organized by the UCI Libraries, focusing on the ambitious early academic and physical planning that laid the groundwork for today's UCI.

June 18 Ceremony Schedule

--School of Biological Sciences: 8 a.m., Aldrich Park

Featured speaker: Irwin A. Rose, Nobel laureate and researcher in the UCI School of Medicine. Rose won the 2004 Nobel Prize in chemistry for his groundbreaking research into the regulatory protein ubiquitin. Rose is a member of the National Academy of Sciences, and previously served as a professor at Yale Medical School and a senior member of the Fox Chase Cancer Center in Philadelphia. Rose has held a special research appointment at UCI since 1997.

--Claire Trevor School of the Arts, School of Physical Sciences and Department of Education: 9 a.m., Bren Events Center

Featured speaker: Kitty Felde '76, host of "Talk of the City" on KPCC-FM. Felde has worked at numerous radio stations in Los Angeles and covered tribunals for war crimes in Yugoslavia and Rwanda. She has been honored as "Radio Journalist of the Year" by the Los Angeles Press Club and the Society of Professional Journalists.

--School of Social Ecology: 10:30 a.m., Aldrich Park

Featured speaker: Joseph Dunn, California senator (D-Garden Grove). Dunn is in his second term representing the 34th district in Orange County. As chairman of the Select Committee to Investigate Price Manipulation of the Wholesale Energy Market, he works with state and federal investigators to pursue criminal and civil indictments against energy traders who may have acted illegally leading up to the state's energy crisis.

Student speaker: Daniel K. Park, baccalaureate candidate, social ecology

--Donald Bren School of Information and Computer Sciences: 1 p.m., Bren Events Center
Featured speaker: Kevin C. Daly, CEO and chairman of Avamar Technologies. Daly was previously CEO of ATL Products, where he led the company through a successful IPO and grew the company from 17 to more than 800 people worldwide. He also worked as the chief technology officer of Quantum Storage Solutions Group before taking the helm at Avamar, a data management firm. Daly has two master's degrees and a doctorate in engineering from Princeton University.

--School of Humanities: 4 p.m., Bren Events Center
Featured speaker: Chieh Chieng, M.F.A. '03, author of "A Long Stay in a Distant Land." An alumnus of UCI's creative writing program, Chieng has been published in Glimmer Train, The Threepenny Review and Santa Monica Review. His debut novel tells the humorous story of three generations of a cursed Chinese American family in Orange County.

Student speaker: Esther Ann Nguonly, baccalaureate candidate, humanities and social sciences

--School of Social Sciences: 5 p.m., Aldrich Park
Featured speaker: Van Tran '90, California assemblyman (R-Costa Mesa). Tran is the first Vietnamese American to take office in a state legislature. He serves on the Business and Professions, Banking and Finance, and Environmental Safety and Toxic Materials committees. Van was previously vice-mayor of Garden Grove and had his own law practice. After graduating from UCI, he earned master's and law degrees from Hamline University in Saint Paul, Minn.

Student speaker: Ambar Anette Ramos, baccalaureate candidate, social sciences

--The Henry Samueli School of Engineering: 7 p.m., Bren Events Center

Featured speaker: Greg Papadopoulos, executive vice president and chief technology officer, Sun Microsystems. Before joining the network computing firm Sun Microsystems in 1994, Papadopoulos was a development engineer at Hewlett-Packard and Honeywell. He also was an associate professor of electrical engineering and computer science at MIT. He holds a bachelor's degree in systems science from UC San Diego, and a doctorate in electrical engineering and computer science from MIT.

Student Speaker: Nadia Ahmed, baccalaureate candidate, engineering


June 19 Ceremony Schedule

--The Paul Merage School of Business: 2 p.m., Bren Events Center.

Featured speaker: Kristen Monson '82, M.B.A. '86, executive vice president, PIMCO. At the investment management firm PIMCO, Monson is an executive vice president, account manager and senior member of the investment strategy group. She founded the PIMCO Institute, an educational program for clients. She has 22 years of investment experience, encompassing portfolio management and trading, and has served as an instructor for the USC/Los Angeles Society of Financial Analysts CFA Review Program.

Commencement admission and parking are free; seating is limited for all ceremonies. Reserved parking will be available for the elderly and physically disabled, with transportation available from the reserved parking areas to the commencement sites; reservations are not required. For more information, call Special Events Parking, (949) 824-8314. Special seating areas are designated in each location.

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About the University of California, Irvine: Celebrating 40 years of innovation, the University of California, Irvine is a top-ranked public university dedicated to research, scholarship and community service. Founded in 1965, UCI is among the fastest-growing University of California campuses, with more than 24,000 undergraduate and graduate students and about 1,400 faculty members. The second-largest employer in dynamic Orange County, UCI contributes an annual economic impact of $3 billion.


Related Links:

www.commencement.uci.edu
www.honorsconvocation.uci.edu
www.today.uci.edu/resources/40