After receiving feedback that convocation is focused too much on the “suits” up on stage, the university is looking into making the ceremony more focused on students.

“There’s been feedback that it’s overly long and that the focus hasn’t been enough on the graduating students as much as it could be,” said university spokesperson John Danakas.
So far, the university has decided to remove the Professor’s Emeritus award in an effort to shorten the ceremony.

Danakas confirmed the administration might look at having fewer speeches as well.
“They’ll look at that. Right now, the first action being taken is moving the Professor’s Emeritus to another venue,” said Danakas. “Everything about the ceremony will be looked at.”

Although there may be sections added in order to bring the ceremony’s focus to the graduating students, nothing has been officially decided yet.

“It’s an ongoing process. We’ve already taken some measures [ . . . ] in order to make convocation [shorter . . . ] We’ve added a number of sessions, both in spring and in fall, to separate out the numbers of graduating students so its not all done in one or two sessions. We have more sessions than we have done in the past,” said Danakas.

“It’s all being looked at and fine tuned, and there are already things that have been done and we will continue to do what we can to make convocation an engaging and meaningful ceremony.”
Some alumni agreed that the ceremony is too long and the changes the university is proposing would be an improvement.

“I agree that it should be just focused on the students, but most graduation events are long and boring,” said Amin Dhillon, a University of Manitoba alumnus.
“I remember my high school graduation had tons of speeches, so I expected my university convocation to be similar.”

Dhillion explained that while she anticipated the ceremony would be long, sitting through the ceremony became tiresome, considering it took over three hours to complete. She also remembered having puzzles on the back of her ceremony schedule.

“I knew from receiving [the puzzles], the administration did recognize how long the ceremony can get and wanted to help combat that, so that was appreciated,” said Dhillion.
“Overall, I’m sure people are going to appreciate a quicker ceremony.”

In comparison, at the University of Saskatchewan, the ceremony normally takes around two hours to complete.

Lea Pennock, university secretary at the University of Saskatchewan, said that over the past five years they’ve seen an increase in the number of people attending the graduating ceremony.
“We’ve seen a bigger percentage of people deciding to come to their graduation ceremonies, which is kind of a nice change.

“It’s not that we’re graduating more people but we’ve had to put on more ceremonies because a bigger proportion come and they want to bring their families so there are more in the audience too,” said Pennock.

Pennock said that the feedback she’s received about convocation at the U of S has been overall positive.

“I can’t say I hear a lot from students. I don’t think in the five years I’ve been here I’ve ever had a letter or call saying they didn’t like their graduation ceremony, but I have to confess I don’t remember having had calls from people saying they loved it,” said Pennock.

“I think in general it’s a feel-good kind of day. There’s a good buzz in the air, both before and after the ceremony.”

U of M students can expect to see these new changes at the upcoming convocation ceremony in the spring.