ASU celebrates spring graduates


About 6,500 students graduated from ASU May 10, which was celebrated with a university-wide commencement ceremony. The university also honored graduates with a variety convocations for schools, colleges, campuses and other groups.

ASU president Michael Crow presents an honorary doctorate of humane letters to scientist Craig Venter.

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Leading scientist Venter to get honorary degree

As part of the ceremony J. Craig Venter, an internationally known scientist who is responsible for developing high-volume genome sequencing, received an honorary doctorate.

Venter, an entrepreneur and maverick in science and business, was named Scientist of the Year by Time magazine in 2000. His success in cracking the human genetic code was called perhaps the most important scientific event of the past century, with implications for almost every aspect of biology and medicine.

Venter is equally recognized as an innovation leader, an advocate for rapid scientific advancement, and a champion of competition and commercialization in the area of biotechnology. He is the founder, chairman and chief executive officer of the J. Craig Venter Institute, a nonprofit research organization that advances the science of genomics and seeks understanding of the field's implications for society.

ASU’s graduating class included a record class of 224 nurses, the most ASU has ever produced in one class, and about 950 teachers, all of whose skills are in high demand.

ASU also is graduating 525 engineers, 880 business undergraduates, 178 lawyers, 650 MBAs, almost 100 architects, 45 urban planners and 130 designers. From the Herberger College of the Arts are 163 talented artists, 107 accomplished musicians, 22 dancers and 37 theater professionals.

The College of Liberal Arts and Sciences is graduating almost 2,000 students, with the most popular majors being psychology, communication, justice studies and political science. About 230 are in the School of Life Sciences. Another 230 students will receive social work degrees, among the College of Public Programs’ 400 graduates.

Overall, the West campus boasts about 1040 graduates, Polytechnic will graduate at least 430, and the Downtown Phoenix campus will have about 630, plus 450 Bachelor of Interdisciplinary Studies graduates who take their classes on all four campuses.