Cal Poly will hold graduation in-person this year. Here’s what it will look like
With COVID-19 conditions improving, Cal Poly announced it will celebrate the Class of 2021 with six in-person commencement events at Alex G. Spanos Stadium on June 12 and 13.
Graduates in attendance will “walk across the stage to have their names read aloud,” President Jeffrey Armstrong wrote in an email on Thursday, and each will receive two guest tickets.
The university said the in-person recognition will be in addition to its official commencement ceremony, which will be hosted virtually on June 11. Degrees will be conferred at that ceremony, and each graduate’s name will be read.
The focus of the in-person events will be to allow graduates to walk across the stage while having their names read aloud again.
On Saturday, June 12, ceremonies will be held for the Orfalea College of Business at 9 a.m., the College of Architecture and Environmental Design at 12:30 p.m., and the College of Engineering at 4 p.m.
The next day, Sunday, June 13, ceremonies will be held for the College of Agriculture, Food and Environmental Sciences at 9 a.m., the College of Science and Mathematics at 12:30 p.m., and the College of Liberal Arts at 4 p.m.
Each event will be livestreamed and not as long as previous ceremonies with multiple colleges, according to Armstrong.
For the ceremonies to happen, San Luis Obispo County must be in the orange tier of California’s Blueprint for a Safer Economy. The university said it “reserves the right to cancel these in-person events at any time.”
To prevent the spread of COVID-19, Cal Poly will implement “assigned seating for guests, face-covering requirements, health screenings, student asymptomatic testing requirements,” and sanitation protocols, according to the commencement website.
Graduates must inform the university of their decision to participate in an in-person ceremony by May 15.
The Class of 2020 will not participate in this event, according to the email, but an in-person event is planned for these graduates in December 2021.
