Last week while eating my lunch in the Elizabeth Herring Memorial Garden, I watched as a School of Music senior had a photograph taken in her graduation regalia. With a mortar board festooned with tissue paper carnations and her oboe in hand, she posed by the water lilies while a photographer with a tripod composed the photograph. Later that same week, I observed other graduates having their photographs taken in front of the Bryan School of Business and Economics and the Alumni House.

Graduation is what a Medievalist colleague likes to call higher education’s most celebratory liturgy—or an ordered series of ideas, phrases, and observances. These photographs are the beginning, or initial observance, of this liturgy. They will be reprinted in hometown newspapers, shared on social media, and tucked into invitations. As with the decorating of mortarboards, they are part of the ordered series of events comprising graduation.

This month CVPA will confer 58 graduate degrees, including the terminal MFA degrees in Art, Dance, and Theatre, and the DMA and PhD degrees in Music. Three of our graduates will earn post-baccalaureate certificates in music education and musicology. CVPA will also confer 185 undergraduate degrees. Fourteen of these students double majored in such subjects as Communication Studies; English; Kinesiology; Language, Literature, and Cultures; and Sociology; and one will graduate with a triple major in Studio Art, Art History, and Classical Studies!

For the first time since the COVID-19 pandemic began, CVPA will be part of in-person commencement ceremonies at the Greensboro Coliseum. In order to maintain social distancing, there will be three separate ceremonies. On May 7th at 1:00 pm, we’ll join in a ceremony with the Bryan School of Business and Economics and School of Education. The following day, there will be a ceremony for UNCG’s 2020 graduates followed by a hooding ceremony for UNCG’s doctoral graduates. I look forward to congratulating each of our CVPA graduates personally on their achievements.

These ceremonies will each include a keynote speech by the Chancellor, student speakers, name reading as students cross the stage, tassel turning, bell ringing, singing of the alma mater, and Elgar’s Pomp and Circumstance March No. 3. Together we will join as a University community to celebrate the Classes of 2021 and 2020, and for the first time during this pandemic, we will be able to complete the celebratory liturgy of graduation. To each graduate, I say Bravo, Well done, and Go make your mark!

The University of North Carolina Board of Governors has selected UNC Greensboro’s Dr. Rebecca B. MacLeod to receive a 2021 Award for Excellence in Teaching. 

MacLeod, Professor of Music Education at UNCG, is a national and international leader in her field. She champions the idea that everyone can and should express themselves musically and artistically. Read more here.