2008 Woodie Awards
ECU graduates its 99th class
Pirates turn the tassel on another year
Natalie Jurgen
Issue date: 5/21/08 Section: News
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Keynote speaker, Thomas J. Spaulding, CEO of "Up With People" and an ECU alumnus, addressed the 2,400 undergraduates, 910 graduate and professional students, 74 medical students and nearly 6,000 family members and friends.
Spaulding told the graduates to see "community service not as a punishment but a privilege" during their lives.
"The world is filled with leaders, followers and critics," said Spaulding. "Which are you going to be?"
ECU Chancellor Steve Ballard also addressed the graduates.
During his welcome, Ballard quoted the Irish poet William Butler Yeats; "Education is not the filling of a pail, but the lighting of a fire."
During his presentation Ballard also awarded three honorary doctor of letter degrees to residents of Eastern North Carolina: Felix Harvey, Valeria Lee and Walter Williams.
Harvey, of Kinston, is a philanthropist and one of the most successful businessmen in North Carolina.
Lee, of Rocky Mount, is a retired president of the Golden LEAF Foundation, an establishment that distributes tobacco-settlement funds to help ease the transition from a tobacco-dependent economy.
Williams is an alumnus and benefactor of ECU and the founder of Trade Oil Co., which merged with WilcoHess.
Williams, after receiving his honorary doctorate degree, told the graduates, "This piece of paper means a lot to me, and I hope yours means a lot to you. You will always be a pirate."
In the ranks were both ECU's and the nation's first three graduates of the medical family therapy doctoral program.
Upon graduation from this research-driven program one graduate plans to teach at a university, the second was hired at an oncology institute and the third will be getting involved with program development in Utah.
ECU's engineering program also graduated its first class of 22 students with concentrations in biomedical engineering, bioprocess engineering, engineering management and systems engineering.
In addition to the bestowal of degrees, five graduates, Vladim Bobrovnikov of Raleigh; Jonathan J. Edwards of Raleigh; Julie D. Goldfarb of Chagrin Falls, Ohio; Sarah Elizabeth Parker Womack of Washington and Christopher K. Vo of Fayetteville received the Robert H. Wright Alumni Leadership Award.
This writer can be contacted at news@theeastcarolinian.com
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