valencia college commencement May 9, 2015 Valencia College forty-sixth annual Commencement May 9, 2015 VALENCIA COLLEGE DISTRICT BOARD OF TRUSTEES Maria Grulich Chair Lewis Oliver, III Vice Chair Bruce Carlson Linda Landman Gonzalez John Crossman Daisy Lopez-Cid Guillermo Hansen Raymer Maguire, III Commencement marks a great achievement for all who are graduating. We ask that you honor these graduates and ensure that everyone can hear by remaining quiet throughout the entire ceremony and silencing all cell phones. Your cooperation is appreciated. Graduates are recognized in order of seating arrangement rather than alphabetical order. Please note that there is a few seconds delay between the announcement of a graduate’s name and his or her appearance on the video screen. Leaving a Legacy – Class of 2015 Support future students by making a donation to the Valencia Graduating Class Gift 2015. For details and to donate online, visit valenciacollege.edu/alumni/classgift. Find photos and video* from today’s event at: Share your own photos: valenciacollege.edu/valenciagrad #valenciagrad flickr.com/photos/myvalencia facebook.com/valenciacollege twitter.com/valenciacollege youtube.com/valenciacollege *Note: Video of ceremony available May 18. VALENCIA COLLEGE COMMENCEMENT PROGRAM Presiding Dr. Sanford C. Shugart, President Special Music Selections ........................................ Valencia Brass Ensemble Mr. Jonathan Territo, Director Processional Pomp and Circumstance .................................................... Elgar *Welcome and Pledge of Allegiance .................................Dr. Sanford C. Shugart Commendation from District Board of Trustees. Ms. Maria Grulich Chair, District Board of Trustees Introduction of Platform Guests and Senior Staff ........................Dr. Kathleen Plinske Campus President, Osceola and Lake Nona Campuses Recognition of Faculty and Staff .....................................Dr. Kathleen Plinske Recognition of Baccalaureate Graduates ............................... Dr. Falecia Williams Campus President, West Campus Recognition of Honors Graduates ....................................Dr. Cheryl Robinson Director, Seneff Honors College Recognition of Scholarship Recipients ................................... Dr. Susan Ledlow Vice President, Academic Affairs and Planning Recognition of Alumni Association Mary Smedley Collier Distinguished Graduate .....................Mr. Zia-ur-Rehman Ansari President, Valencia Alumni Association Commencement Address .............................................Ms. Rebecca Nash 2014-2015 Distinguished Graduate Presentation of Graduates ........................................Dr. Sanford C. Shugart Conferring of Degrees ...........................................Dr. Sanford C. Shugart Ms. Maria Grulich, Chair Ms. Daisy Lopez-Cid, Trustee Mr. Lew Oliver III, Vice Chair Mr. Raymer Maguire III, Trustee Mr. Bruce Carlson, Trustee Ms. Suzette Dohany, Incoming President, Mr. John Crossman, Trustee Collegewide Faculty Association Mr. Guillermo Hansen, Trustee Mr. Steve Cunningham, Professor Ms. Linda Landman Gonzalez, Trustee Mr. Richard Sansone, Professor Closing Remarks .................................................. Dr. Stacey Johnson Campus President, East and Winter Park Campuses **Recessional ........................................................ 2015 Graduates Heroes (We Could Be) ......................................................Alesso I Lived ...........................................................One Republic Keep Your Head Up ...............................................Andy Grammer * The audience stands. ** The audience is requested to remain seated until the graduate and faculty recessional has left the arena. 1 A MESSAGE FROM THE ALUMNI ASSOCIATION May 9, 2015 Dear Valencia Graduate: Today, we celebrate you and your actualization of the Valencia dream. On behalf of the Valencia College Alumni Association, we congratulate you on a significant milestone in your educational pursuit – your graduation. Whether you are going straight into a high-skill, high-wage job or transferring to a four-year university as a junior with guaranteed admission, we commend you for your academic, co-curricular, and personal achievements while attending Valencia College. As a graduate of Valencia College, you should find great pride that you have received an education from one of the finest educational institutions in the nation and the inaugural winner of the ZIA-UR-REHMAN Aspen Prize for Community College Excellence. ANSARI Today, you are taking the next step in your Valencia journey by joining over 128,000 alumni from across the world as you continue your life’s pursuits and reach other achievements. We invite you to keep the relationship you have established with Valencia alive by being active with the Valencia College Alumni Association. Maintaining this unique bond with our alumni, like you and me, has been what Valencia honors and cherishes most. Through your continued involvement in Alumni Association programs and activities, you will not only be able to give back to the college but also to be a part of its future. Thanks to the community and our alumni membership, we continue to create and strengthen many wonderful and diverse opportunities for our students. As a graduate of Valencia College, you can join the Alumni Association at no cost. Your free membership in the Alumni Association offers you a rich array of benefits and opportunities such as: information regarding future plans for Valencia, leadership and networking opportunities, national and local discounts, cultural events, career information, a subscription to Vitae–Valencia’s alumni magazine–and updates on your former classmates. The association includes five special interest groups for alumni, such as those for Honors, Bridges, International Students, Osceola Campus and Veterans with many more to come. We wish you the best in all of your future endeavors and look forward to hearing about all of your accomplishments! Again, congratulations to you and to the Class of 2015 graduates who are celebrating their achievements today. Welcome to the Valencia Alumni Association and welcome to start of your new journey. Yours in scholarship, friendship and service, Zia-ur-Rehman Ansari ’10 Executive Vice President Valencia Alumni Association 2 VALENCIA COLLEGE ALUMNI ASSOCIATION MARY SMEDLEY COLLIER DISTINGUISHED GRADUATE AWARD* Rebecca Nash 2014-2015 DISTINGUISHED GR ADUATE Rebecca Nash’s journey to college started, With Savage as her mentor, Rebecca unbelievably, when she dropped out of conducted research on the Congo, its high school. relationship to the Rwandan genocide and wrote papers and presented workshops that Of course, she had a good reason. During her wowed Valencia professors. After leading a junior year in high school, when her father workshop on Africa’s “silenced voices,” she became seriously ill and was hospitalized received a standing ovation from students frequently, Rebecca’s mother struggled to and faculty. “With the support of Dr. Savage, support the family alone. Seeing that, Rebecca Rebecca facilitated one of the strongest dropped out of high school and landed a presentations of the week—weaving her full-time job, working at a greeting card store. research with provocative questions for the participants that challenged American But selling greeting cards wasn’t fulfilling. perceptions about Africa and brought us to So in her free time, Rebecca earned her think critically about why we ignore Africa,” GED and began volunteering at a domestic said Valencia Professor Rachel Allen. “The violence shelter in Broward County. There, she professors in the room could not help but became a peer facilitator for 14 teenaged girls comment on the exceptional quality – many of whom had been kidnapped from their villages in the of her scholarship and presentation.” Democratic Republic of Congo and sold to human traffickers. Savage, meanwhile, challenged Rebecca to write papers that would Their stories of sexual violence and rape camps – where many were impress genocide scholars. “He was phenomenal when it came to raped by soldiers—pained Rebecca, who’d spent much of her life guiding me,” Rebecca says. “He pushed me harder than I’d ever learning of the Holocaust from her father, a Russian Jew. “I think been pushed.” He handed her stacks of books to read, demanded what stuck with me was that this wasn’t considered out of the better writing and helped her set a career goal—to become a norm,” said Rebecca. “Women are targeted in the Congo.” genocide analyst for the United Nations. She vowed to do something about the atrocities there. After her Savage says she has been an exceptional student. “Her father recovered, Rebecca moved to Orlando and enrolled at commitment and engagement to learning is of the caliber I Valencia, living on a bare-bones budget, but passionate about normally expected of my Ph.D. students,” he noted. classes. Here, she met Professor Michael Savage, a former British military officer who teaches the history of genocide. Now 20 years old, Rebecca—this year’s Mary Smedley Collier Distinguished Graduate—will skip her final two years of After attending a campus discussion on the current conflict in undergraduate study and this fall will start classes as a graduate Syria, Rebecca stopped to speak to Savage, who’d served on the student at Royal Holloway, University of London, where she has panel. As Rebecca explained her work with the Congolese teens been offered a full scholarship