UI to award 4,750 degrees

IOWA CITY -- An estimated 4,757 University of Iowa graduates will receive degrees during spring 2010 commencement ceremonies.

The  UI commencement schedule is:

• College of Pharmacy, 10 a.m.,  May 13, Marriott Hotel and Conference Center, Coralville. The speaker is Dr. Dennis Helling, executive director of pharmacy operations and therapeutics with Kaiser Permanente Colorado Region.
• Tippie School of Management, 10 a.m., May 14, Marriott Hotel and Conference Center, Coralville. The speaker will be Clay Jones, chairman, president and CEO of Rockwell Collins.
• College of Law, 1 p.m., May 14, Iowa Memorial Union Main Lounge. The speaker will be Mark Cady, associate justice on the Iowa Supreme Court.
• Carver College of Medicine, 6:30 p.m., May 14, Marriott Hotel and Conference Center, Coralville. Dr. Christopher Buresh, a clinical assistant professor in the UI Department of Emergency Medicine and an alumnus, will be the speaker.
• College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, 9 a.m., May 15, Carver-Hawkeye Arena. Television journalist and author Tom Brokaw will be the speaker.
• College of Nursing, 9 a.m., May 15, Iowa Memorial Union Main Lounge. The speaker will be Debra Sue Forbes, RN-BSN from Mt. Vernon.
• College of Engineering, 3 p.m., May 15, Iowa Memorial Union Main Lounge. The speaker will be Gregs G. Thomopulos, CEO and chairman of the Board of Stanley Consultants Inc. in Muscatine.
• Graduate College, 3 p.m., May 15, Carver-Hawkeye Arena. The speaker will be Judith Liskin-Gasparro, associate professor of Spanish and Portuguese in the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences who is also affiliated with Second Language Acquisition, a UI Graduate College program.
• Tippie College of Business, 1 p.m., May 16, Carver-Hawkeye Arena. The speaker will be Chuck Peters, president and chief executive officer of Gazette Communications Inc.
• College of Dentistry, 3 p.m., June 4, Marriott Hotel & Conference Center. UI College of Dentistry Dean David Johnsen will address the graduates.

Brokaw is one of three dignitaries attending the CLAS commencement ceremony who will be awarded Honorary Doctor of Humane Letters degrees. The other recipients are Pulitzer Prize winner and former U.S. Poet Laureate Robert Hass and former UI women's head basketball coach C. Vivian Stringer.

Thomopulos will receive an Honorary Doctor of Science at the College of Engineering commencement ceremony. John Pappajohn, one of Iowa's most influential entrepreneurs and philanthropists, will receive an Honorary Doctor of Humane letters at the Tippie College of Business commencement ceremony.