Last December’s commencement ceremony was back on campus for the first time in over 15 years. Students crossed the stage in D.L. Ligon Coliseum, just a few minutes’ walk from the classes, dorm halls and student areas that made up such a large part of their lives for years. The previous decade-and-a-half before fall 2023 commencement saw students commuting to the Multipurpose Events Center in downtown Wichita Falls for a university-wide commencement extravaganza.
Now, commencement is split into three separate ceremonies; one for the colleges of Dillard, Fain and West, one for Gunn, McCoy and Prothro-Yeager and a separate ceremony for graduate students.
Bolin distinguished chair of piano Ruth Morrow is a mace-bearer, an honor granted to long-tenured faculty. Mace-bearers get to lead students out into the graduation assembly.
After starting nearly 35 years ago in 1989, Morrow said she remembers the days before graduation split, then moved off-campus.
“At first we just had one, and it was long,” Morrow said, dragging out the word “long,” before continuing, “So then we broke it in two. And President Rodriguez would actually have a lunch for the faculty in-between. Because every faculty member was supposed, and expected to go to both graduations. Yeah, so it didn’t matter if you had people graduating in that graduation or not.”
Now, faculty are only required to attend graduation for their respective college. The change in format allows both students and faculty to get in and out quicker while returning to MSU’s roots.
President Stacia Haynie walked the stage at D.L. Ligon in her time as a student, and said she’s glad to see the event back at MSU.
“I’ve only ever graduated from MSU in the Coliseum, so it was especially exciting for me to be here when it was returning to campus,” Haynie said.
While part of Haynie’s job is leading the university in areas like culture and heritage, another part is balancing the school’s budget. The school entered the fiscal year with a budget deficit of over seven million dollars, and has since cleared up around half of that deficit.
Moving back to campus from the MPEC allows MSU to save nearly $20,000 annually. Per information obtained via an open records request to the Texas Tech University System, MSU paid over $9,500 to rent the facility for last spring’s commencement.
Registrar Amanda Raines said the cost savings are important to the school.
“In regards to the cost savings, of course bringing it back to campus meant that we were able to use our own facility. So I’m not being charged a rental fee for the Coliseum, whereas downtown using the MPEC, being involved with the city of Wichita Falls, quite a gigantic cost savings as far as renting out the MPEC,” Raines said.
One initial concern students had with the move back to campus was that the university required tickets for admission since the venue was smaller. After testing out the format last December, Raines said those limitations have been removed.
“But because the Coliseum is small, we thought, this very first go around, yes, we are going to have to limit the number of family and friends that are going to be able to participate just because we didn’t know what we were looking at,” Raines said, continuing, “Turns out that that is not necessary. So moving forward, tickets are not going to be allowed and until enrollment grows, that’s not going to be a concern.”
Raines added that the university will continue to look for ways to fine-tune the event and improve the experience for students and their families.
“We’ll be having meetings coming up, you know, the wrongs, the rights, what do we need to change. And there’s just a few things that we’re going to tweak. Not anything in particular that’s going to drastically change anything, but it’s just the growing pains of what we experienced,” Raines said.
Morrow said an added benefit of the move is that it showcases the campus to more community members and families.
“For a lot of people I think it, it gives that opportunity for students to show off where they’ve been to family and friends who come. And hopefully, for us to show off our campus, especially to younger siblings who may want to come here. It’s like they see more, they actually get to see us as a university in a way that they wouldn’t,” Morrow said.
Spring commencement is scheduled for May 10-11, with the graduate ceremony beginning at 6 p.m. Friday, May 10, followed by the Dillard, Fain and West ceremony at 10 a.m. Saturday, May 11 and Gunn, McCoy and Prothro-Yeager right after at 2 p.m.
