Commencement Ceremonies Celebrate Work of 1,200

Omaha – This holiday season will be particularly festive for the approximately 1,200 students who will be graduating at the University of Nebraska at Omaha’s (UNO) 2013 December Commencement, taking place on Saturday, Dec. 21.

For the third year, UNO’s December Commencement ceremonies will be held on campus, with two ceremonies, taking place at 9 a.m. and 2 p.m. respectively, held inside the Lee and Helene Sapp Fieldhouse.

The 9 a.m. event will feature the bachelor’s, master’s and doctoral-level graduates from the colleges of Arts and Sciences; Education; Engineering (UNL); and Communication, Fine Arts and Media. The 2 p.m. event will feature graduates from the colleges of Business Administration; Public Affairs and Community Service; and Information Science and Technology.

Fieldhouse doors will open at 7 a.m. for the 9 a.m. ceremony and at noon for the 2 p.m. ceremony. The campus will have open parking the day of commencement with Lot N being designated handicap parking and Lot O being reserved for members of the commencement platform party.

Graduates are encouraged to park in the east parking garage behind Arts and Sciences Hall. All three levels will be opened for guest parking and UNO will provide shuttles from the garage to the Sapp Fieldhouse.

Maps of campus are available at www.unomaha.edu/maps.

*** Visit the 2013 December Commencement Page By Clicking Here ****

Each of the two ceremonies will feature student speakers from the colleges’ graduate and undergraduate levels.

The speakers at the 9 a.m. ceremony will be graduate student Kristin Graeve-Zimmerman, a previous graduate of Creighton University who will be earning her Master of Science in Counseling and Student Affairs, and Dominique Worthing, a Creative Nonfiction major who will be earning a Bachelor of Arts degree from the College of Arts and Sciences.

The speakers at the 2 p.m. ceremony will be Tyler Gassaway, another former Creighton graduate who is earning a Master of Business Administration degree, and Angela Friedman, who is earning a Bachelor of General Studies degree with concentrations in behavioral health, health education and theatre.

Also as part of the two ceremonies, each college will feature student marshals who will lead their fellow classmates into the Fieldhouse. Each student marshal was chosen by a vote from within his or her college.

Each ceremony will also celebrate those who have already graduated, as the UNO Alumni Association will be honoring two alumni for their professional success and contributions to their communities.

Awards will be presented to Gail DeBoer, a 1987 graduate and current president of SAC Federal Credit Union; and Ron Withem, a 1973 graduate, former state senator former speaker of the Nebraska unicameral and current director of governmental relations for the University of Nebraska.

Those who cannot physically attend the ceremony are encouraged to watch on UNO’s UStream channel: http://www.ustream.tv/channel/university-of-nebraska-at-omaha.

For more information or media inquiries, please contact Charley Reed, UNO media relations coordinator, at unonews@unomaha.edu or by phone at 402.554.2129.

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The University of Nebraska at Omaha (UNO) is Nebraska’s metropolitan university. The core values of the institution place students at the center of all that the university does; call for the campus to strive for academic excellence; and promote community engagement that transforms and improves urban, regional, national and global life. UNO, inaugurated in 1968, emerged from the Municipal University of Omaha, established in 1931, which grew out of the University of Omaha founded in 1908.