First-Generation Graduate Uplifts Her Community
Invested in local outreach programs and community service, Pride of the Southland Color Guard squad leader Uriah Richey plans to dedicate her career to helping others.
Invested in local outreach programs and community service, Pride of the Southland Color Guard squad leader Uriah Richey plans to dedicate her career to helping others.
Adam Larkey, a spring 2020 industrial and systems engineering graduate, will join the workforce soon, but his first career began when he picked up the fiddle as a six-year-old.
Although in-person commencement ceremonies in May had to be postponed for safety, UT will recognize graduates and their outstanding achievements over the next few weeks.
Volunteer. Leadership. Service. Those three words were spoken many times on Friday as more than a thousand UT students walked across the commencement stage in Thompson-Boling Arena to receive their diplomas.
Five students graduated December 13 with more than 225 hours of community service each, earning the gold service medallion awarded by the Jones Center for Leadership and Service.
Conny Sidi Kazungu remembers hearing her dad’s voice on the other end of the phone and exhaling. Only minutes earlier, she had heard the blast from her home. Suicide bombers in trucks parked outside the US Embassy in Nairobi had exploded, killing more than 200 people.
On November 15, the night before Garth Brooks’s sold-out concert inside Neyland Stadium, Ashley Humphrey stood a few feet away from the singer during his sound check, waiting to ask for a favor. “Garth, will you sign my graduation cap?” she shouted during a pause in the music.
From his first week on campus four years ago, Mustafa Ali-Smith had his mind set. He would become the first person in his family to graduate from college. But as important as succeeding academically was to him, he knew he wanted to do more, too.
Kylie Hubbard is ready for her next story. Hubbard has concluded her third semester as editor-in-chief of UT’s independent student newspaper, the Daily Beacon. She graduated this month with a bachelor’s degree in journalism and electronic media.
UT senior Travis Bryan, a student veteran, dreams about graduating in December and walking into his future.
UT’s fall undergraduate commencement and graduate hooding ceremonies will be held December 12 and 13.
In commencement ceremonies last week, the university awarded 4,228 degrees.