William Woods University Plans Commencement Aug. 1

7/28/2008 Mary Ann Beahon
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE (573) 592-1127

 

A William Woods University award-winning history professor will address the August graduates during WWU’s 12th summer commencement Friday, Aug. 1.

Stephen Hageman, instructor of history, will give the commencement speech. He is the 2008 recipient of the Louis D. Beaumont Dad’s Association Distinguished Professor Award for Excellence in Teaching at WWU.

A total of 257 students will graduate. With increased campus enrollment and the growth of the university’s outreach programs, William Woods now holds graduation ceremonies in May, August and December each year. The combined total of graduates in the past 12 months is 1,101.

The commencement ceremony and hooding of candidates for graduate degrees will be held at 7 p.m. in Cutlip Auditorium of the McNutt Campus Center. The university will grant 16 associate of arts, two bachelor of arts, 23 bachelor of science, 110 master of business administration, 88 master of education and 18 specialist of education in school administration degrees.

Students from Graduate & Adult Studies cohorts in Blue Springs, Cape Girardeau, Chillicothe, Columbia, Creighton, Dora, Ellington, Fulton, Hannibal, Iberia, Jefferson City, Joplin, Kansas City, St. Joseph, Troy and Versailles will receive their diplomas.

In addition, 35 students from the Southeast Asian island of Taiwan will graduate. William Woods has had a program of educating students from Taiwan since 1992.

The commencement speaker, Hageman, received his bachelor of arts degree from Miami University in Oxford, Ohio, and is a Ph.D. candidate at the University of Illinois. He has taught at the University of Illinois and Bloomsburg University in Bloomsburg, Pa.

He is affiliated with Phi Alpha Theta, a history honor society, and Phi Beta Kappa, an academic honor society, as well as the American Historical Association, the Organization of American Historians, the Labor and Working Class History Association and the American Studies Association.

Hageman was the recipient of the Louisville Institute for the Study of American Religion Dissertation Fellow at the University of Illinois in 2004-2005, and the John G. and Evelyn Hartman Heiligenstein Award for Excellence in Undergraduate Teaching in 2001 and 2004.