ETSU Commencement Celebrates Class of 2020 and 2021

JOHNSON CITY – East Tennessee State University returned to in-person Commencement activities last week, celebrating the graduation of more than 2,000 graduates in the Class of 2021 and recognizing members of the Class of 2020 who returned to campus to cross the stage after being honored in virtual ceremonies last year.

The university hosted several ceremonies over the course of four days instead of the traditional two Saturday ceremonies and implemented a number of protocols for the health and well-being of graduates, their families and all participants.

ETSU awarded 2,091 degrees at the baccalaureate, master’s and doctoral levels to members of the Class of 2021. Of the 1,609 graduates receiving baccalaureate degrees, 800 graduated with honors for grade point averages of 3.5 and above. Also awarded during the ceremonies were 54 graduate certificates.

In addition, ETSU’s Gatton College of Pharmacy hosted a commencement and hooding ceremony for the 72 student pharmacists who comprised the college’s 12th graduating class, and the Quillen College of Medicine’s ceremony recognized its 40th graduating class of 73 medical students, who received their doctoral hoods and took the Hippocratic Oath as new physicians.

A special ceremony was held Friday, May 7, honoring the Class of 2020 graduates. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, degrees were conferred through virtual ceremonies in May and December of last year to 3,456 students at the baccalaureate, master’s and doctoral levels, plus College of Medicine and College of Pharmacy graduates. This spring, those students were given the opportunity to don caps and gowns and cross the Commencement stage. 

In conjunction with Commencement, 12 ETSU graduates took the oath of office as second lieutenants in the U.S. Army, marking the culmination of their ROTC leadership training, in a special ceremony in which alumna Maj. Gen. (Ret.) Leslie Purser was the guest speaker. The College of Nursing held its traditional Convocation welcoming newly graduated nurses into the profession or to advanced practice specialties, and a Multicultural/Lavender Graduation Celebration was held to honor the achievements and diverse identities/ethnicities of graduating seniors from both 2020 and the spring of 2021.

A number of ETSU alumni, faculty and administrators shared wisdom gained through their life experiences as guest speakers during the ceremonies. These speakers and the ceremonies in which they participated were:

• Dr. James Ellzy, a member of the Quillen College of Medicine Class of 1996 – Quillen College of Medicine, Thursday, May 6;
• Aamir Shaikh, 2019-20 Student Government Association President – Class of 2020, Friday, May 7;
• 
  Dr. Brooks Pond, a Gatton College of Pharmacy faculty member and winner of ETSU’s 2020 Distinguished Faculty Award in Teaching – College of Arts and Sciences, May 7;
• 
  Dr. Lisa Piercey, Tennessee Commissioner of Health and a Quillen College of Medicine graduate – Clemmer College and College of Public Health, Saturday, May 8;
• 
  Beth Bass, a College of Arts and Sciences graduate and former ETSU basketball player with a longtime career in athletic marketing – College of Clinical and Rehabilitative Health Sciences and College of Nursing, May 8; and
• 
  Dr. Wilsie Bishop, provost and senior vice president for academics – College of Business and Technology, Cross-Disciplinary Studies, Pharmacy Studies and Global Sport Leadership, Sunday, May 9.

In her Commencement address – her “last lecture,” so to speak, as she plans to retire from ETSU at the end of June following 43 years of service – Bishop encouraged graduates to step forward into growth.

“As you move on to jobs or professional or graduate schools and new adventures, you will be confronted with two options,” she said. “You can accept the challenges that you will face and step forward into growth, or you can avoid risk and step back into safety. However, if you avoid the challenges and you fail to take the risks, you most likely will be delaying – or even forgoing – to use your education, to use your knowledge, to use your skills, to enrich your life and to enhance the contributions that you can make to society.

“Celebrate the opportunities that lie ahead of you, embrace the challenges that you will face with enthusiasm, and seek experiences that will help you grow both personally and professionally. Say yes when opportunities are presented to you. Seek out new experiences. Do not be inhibited by artificial barriers that your or other people place in your way. Do not be satisfied with the status quo. Instead, know that you have the power within you to make a difference when you say yes to opportunity. As you step forward into growth, take with you a set of values that will keep you centered and guide your decisions. Do not be silenced by the crowd, but reach within yourself to seek truth and justice. In doing so, you will find ways that will make a difference in your work, in your personal lives, and in your communities, and indeed, even in the world.”

A digital version of the Commencement Program and webcast links for each Commencement ceremony are available at etsu.edu/classof2021.