Events

Congratulations, class of 2023! We look forward to celebrating with you at our departmental commencement event in June.

EVENT DETAILS AND EXPECTATIONS:

The departmental event is a smaller, more personal ceremony for our graduates and their families. You will be able to celebrate your accomplishment with your fellow classmates and the English department’s faculty and staff.

Our departmental event includes:

• Addresses from the Department of English chair, featured faculty speaker, and featured alumni speaker.
• Announcement of Dept. of English creative writing awards, essay contest winners, and departmental honors designations.
• Individual recognition of graduates: your name will be called and you will cross the stage for a ceremonial photo with the chair. We ask that all graduates and their guests remain until the end of the ceremony to honor each student as their name is announced.
• Faculty receiving line: after all graduates have received individual recognition, our faculty will form a receiving line to congratulate you on your accomplishments. The end of the receiving line marks the end of our ceremony.

Our departmental ceremony typically lasts 1.5 – 2 hours. Please plan accordingly when making restaurant reservations, travel plans, etc.

Our departmental ceremony does not include College Honors or Latin Honors announcements.

ONLINE REGISTRATION FORM AND TICKET ORDERING:

Participating students must confirm that they are attending via our online registration form (available on this page in May). Each participating student may order (4) free guest tickets and up to (4) additional tickets for $20.00 each. There will be a wait list for additional ticket orders. Ticket ordering will take place via MyUCLA in May (exact dates TBA).

**Graduating seniors – please keep an eye on your inboxes for a detailed email to be sent during the first week in May.**

2023 FEATURED SPEAKERS:

Our 2023 Faculty Speaker will be Professor Emerita King-Kok Cheung (full bio here.)

We are pleased to introduce our 2023 Alumnus Speaker: Author Antoine Wilson.

Antoine Wilson is the award-winning author of the novels Mouth to Mouth, Panorama City, and The Interloper. His fiction has appeared in The Paris Review, StoryQuarterly, Best New American Voices, and the Los Angeles Times, among other publications, and he is a contributing editor of A Public Space. Antoine attended UCLA and the Iowa Writers’ Workshop, and was a recipient of the Carol Houck Smith Fiction Fellowship from the University of Wisconsin. He lives in Los Angeles.

For more information about the College of Letters & Science virtual commencement events, please visit the UCLA Commencement website.

Students with questions about College Commencement or academic eligibility to participate may direct their inquiries here: http://www.college.ucla.edu/commencement/help/contact/.

Past Departmental commencement speakers:

Matea Gold (2018)

Randall Park (2017)

Christopher Zyda (2013)