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“This year, our ceremony is virtual, but the pride and joy we feel today could not be more real.”

—President Melvin L. Oliver

Although �鶹ԭ��’s Class of 2021 could not gather on campus under a tent for Commencement this year, �鶹ԭ��’s graduating seniors took center stage during a virtual commencement ceremony on May 15, 2021.

Student speakers and performers—all from the Class of 2021—included Kyle Davis, Zawadi Doti, Veronica Martinez, Yusef Pierce, Kay Wright, Ralph Zamora, and Becca Zimmerman. Pierce, the first student to earn a BA from �鶹ԭ�� while incarcerated, read a letter his mother sent him when he was at the beginning of a 19-year prison sentence. “Education is your key to success,” she wrote.

The ceremony also featured President Oliver, faculty, staff, and keynote speaker U.S. Representative Mondaire Jones, who asked seniors to “step up and step into the world.” �鶹ԭ�� President Melvin L. Oliver closed the ceremony by charging the Class of 2021 to make the world a better place, but to do it with “the love that brings light to darkness, the love that buries hate, the love that transforms enemies into friends, the love that gives grace to those who struggle.”

—including Class of 2021 student performances and speeches—to celebrate �鶹ԭ��’s newest graduates as they step up and into the next chapter of their lives.