Marquette University to confer 2,000 degrees Sunday, May 23

Commencement ceremony to be webcast

Event Information
Date: Sunday, May 23
Time: 9:30 a.m.
Place: Bradley Center, 1001 N. 4th Street

MILWAUKEE – Nearly 1,300 undergraduates and more than 700 graduate and professional students will receive their Marquette degrees at the school’s Commencement ceremony Sunday, May 23, at 9:30 a.m. at the Bradley Center, 1001 N. 4th St.

For the first time Commencement will be webcast so that family and friends of graduates who are not able to be in Milwaukee can participate in the ceremony.

This year’s Baccalaureate Mass will be held Saturday, May 22, at 4:30 p.m. at the U.S. Cellular Arena, 400 W. Kilbourn Ave.  

Commencement speaker, honorary degree recipient:
Wendy Kopp, founder and chief executive of Teach For America
Kopp proposed the creation of Teach For America in her undergraduate senior thesis at Princeton University in 1989 and has spent the last 20 years working to sustain and grow the organization. Teach for America expanded to Milwaukee this year with a cohort of 38 teachers and has 7,300 corps members teaching in 35 urban and rural regions across the country. Marquette is one of two local universities providing coursework for the corps members that will enable them to earn a master’s degree in education and complete Wisconsin’s teacher licensure requirements in two years.   

Student speaker:
Nicholas Ingraham, physiological sciences, Helen Way Klingler College of Arts and Sciences
During his time at Marquette, Ingraham has been on the Dean’s List, held numerous leadership positions and was involved in a variety of community service activities. A native of Omaha, Neb., he volunteered at Aurora Sinai Hospital, is a member of the American Medical Student Association, and volunteers on the Marquette Senior Challenge Committee.

Other honorary degree recipients:
Joan Biskupic, Supreme Court biographer and veteran journalist, author of American Original: The Life and Constitution of Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia; Sandra Day O'Connor: How the First Woman on the Supreme Court Became Its Most Influential Justice; and several other books on the Supreme Court.
 
Anne M. Burke, Illinois Supreme Court Justice and founder of the Chicago Special Olympics, a precursor to the international Special Olympics, Inc.
 
Janice McLaughlin, M.M., president of the Maryknoll Sisters and author of Ostriches, Dung Beetles and Other Spiritual Masters: A book of Wisdom from the Wild, based on her experiences in Africa, and On the Frontline - Catholic Missions and Zimbabwe’s Liberation War.
 
Both Biskupic and McLaughlin are Marquette alumnae.

Media interested in attending Marquette’s Commencement should contact Christopher Stolarski in the Office of Marketing and Communication at (414) 288-1988 (office), (414) 235-6060 (mobile), or e-mail christopher.stolarski@marquette.edu.