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A new graduate gets a hug from an audience member during the May 2011 commencement ceremony

Graduate and undergraduate commencement ceremonies will take place Saturday, December 17, 2011, honoring 1,009 students.

The ceremony for graduate students will be at 10:00 a.m. in Fisher Auditorium, part of the IUP Performing Arts Center. The undergraduate ceremony will be at 1:00 p.m. in the Kovalchick Convention and Athletic Complex.

Lynn Botelho, a faculty member in the History Department and IUP's 2011-12 University Professor, will serve as the keynote speaker for both ceremonies. The University Professorship is an annual award that comes with a lifetime title presented to an IUP faculty member based on outstanding teaching, research, scholarly activity, and service.

Michelle L. Taddie, of Homer City, a Biology/Pre-veterinary major and Chemistry minor, will be the student speaker for the undergraduate ceremony. William B. Vogler, of Bethlehem, a doctoral student in the Administration and Leadership Studies program, will be the student speaker for the graduate ceremony.

A new graduate waves to the crowd during the May 2011 commencement ceremony.

Taddie is a member of the Cook Honors College and completed her course work in the Biology Honors Program. She is a provost scholar, a Dean's List student, and a member of the executive board of the IUP Ambassadors student group. She is also a pole-vaulter on the IUP track and field team.

Vogler is executive director of a human services organization in Allentown. His son, Greg, is also graduating from IUP with an undergraduate degree in Music.

The degree breakdown is as follows: 5 associate degrees, 498 undergraduate degrees, 396 master's degrees, and 112 doctoral degrees. Students who completed their master's or doctoral work in August or who are completing it in December are invited to participate in the December ceremony.

The commencement ceremony will be broadcast live on the Penn Atlantic website.

Lynn Botelho, 2011-2012 University Professor

Botelho joined the IUP faculty in 1996 as an assistant professor of history and was promoted to the rank of professor in 2005. She also serves as a core course professor in the Cook Honors College, a position she has held since 2000. She has served on the Cook Honors College admissions committee and achievement fund committee and on the IUP international scholarship committee, representing IUP at Truman-Marshall Fellowship conferences.

Botelho serves in several international executive positions in the field of British studies, including as president of the North American Conference on British Studies. In this role, she organized and hosted the national meeting of the organization in November 2010. This conference brought a near-record-setting number of participants from throughout the world.

Altogether, Botelho has organized three international conferences, six national-regional conferences, a local conference, and the Western ºÚÁϳԹÏÍø Undergraduate History Forum.

She is active in many departmental and university committees, including the Foundation for IUP Board of Directors, serving as faculty representative, and the Women's Studies Committee, serving on the committee in charge of the five-year review. She is also on the Universitywide Promotion Committee.

Botelho has published 7 books and 13 articles or essays, including “Old Age and the English Poor Law, 1500-1700,” the first ever extended study of its kind. One of her essays, “Old Age in Seventeenth-Century Europe,” which appears in The History of Old Age, was a Book of the Month Club option in German.

In addition to her being named University Professor, Botelho was honored by the university with the Distinguished Faculty Award for Research in 2008 and by the History Department with the Service Award for Outstanding Service to the Department in 2002.

The following undergraduates will be honored during the undergraduate ceremony for achieving a perfect 4.0 grade-point average: