Ohio University Graduate Commencement Speaker Emphasizes the Importance of Lifelong Learning

Contact: Jennifer Kirksey Smith, (740) 593-1043

Editor's Note: Photos of today's graduate commencement ceremony can be downloaded from the Web at www.ohiou.edu/news/pix/COMMENCE_GRAD1.JPG; and www.ohiou.edu/news/pix/COMMENCE_GRAD2.JPG.

ATHENS, Ohio (June 8, 2001) -- Professor of Interpersonal Communication Claudia Hale drew on her experience as a teacher and a learner at Ohio University's graduate commencement today in the Convocation Center.

Some 657 master's and Ph.D. degree candidates participated in today's commencement ceremony. The undergraduate commencement ceremony is Saturday, June 9.

Hale, honored as the 2000 Outstanding Graduate Faculty Member, gave the gift of four wishes to the graduates: Always continue to learn and be enthusiastic about learning; Find appropriate ways to share one's knowledge, but if that is not possible, then share the love for learning; Live a life of constructive difference; and always be capable of finding creative ways to meet the challenges life possesses.

"Use your imagination to successfully tame the tigers in your life," she said.

Since 1998, Hale has served as liaison to Bangkok University working with 16 Thai doctoral students (enrolled in a joint Ohio University/Bangkok University program in interpersonal communications) as they complete and defend their dissertations. She earned her doctorate in speech communication from the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign.

More than 3,000 undergraduates are expected at Ohio University's two commencement ceremonies tomorrow, when Clarence Page, Pulitzer Prize-winning columnist for The Chicago Tribune, will address the 10 a.m. and 2:30 p.m. sessions in the 13,000-seat Convocation Center.