The ceremonies, which will conclude the university's 142nd academic year, will be held at Wayne State's Matthaei Athletics Complex to accommodate the university's various schools and colleges. (See below for a schedule of which schools/colleges will be represented at each of the events.)
Receiving honorary doctoral degrees will be civil rights activist and author Grace Lee Boggs, executive director of the Michigan Opera Theatre David DiChiera, and A. Paul Schaap, founder and president of Lumigen, Inc., the world's largest supplier of chemiluminescent reagents to the clinical immunodiagnostics market.
Schaap and DiChiera will receive their degrees at 2 p.m. and 6 p.m. on May 6, respectively. Boggs will receive her honorary degree at 2 p.m. on May 7.
Grace Lee Boggs is an activist, writer and speaker whose more than 60 years of political involvement encompass the major U.S. social movements of this century: labor, civil rights, Asian-American, women's and environmental justice.
Born in Providence, R.I. of Chinese immigrant parents in 1915, Grace received her B.A. from Barnard College in 1935 and a Ph.D. in Philosophy from Bryn Mawr College in 1940.
In 1992, along with husband James Boggs, she founded Detroit Summer, a multicultural, intergenerational youth program to rebuild, redefine and rejuvenate the spirit of Detroit. Boggs currently works with the Detroit City of Hope campaign and writes for the weekly Michigan Citizen. Her autobiography, Living for Change, published by the University of Minnesota Press in March 1998, is widely used in university classes in Asian-American studies, on Detroit, and on social movements. Boggs will receive an honorary Doctor of Laws degree.
David DiChiera, executive director of the Michigan Opera Theatre, will receive an honorary Doctor of Humane Letters degree. DiChiera is the founding general director of the Michigan Opera Theatre and founding general director (1986-1996) of Opera Pacific in Orange County, California. Both are among the top professional opera companies in the United States.
DiChiera, son of Italian immigrants, was born in McKeesport, Pennsylvania, and raised in Los Angeles, California. He graduated from UCLA in 1956 with highest honors and election to Phi Beta Kappa.
DiChiera lead the establishment of the Music Hall Center for the Performing Arts, which, under his artistic leadership as founding director, began a tradition of providing theater, music and dance for Michigan. His dual role as general director of Michigan Opera Theatre and artistic director for the center, with its multi-purpose 1,800-seat theater, was noted in the national press. The Christian Science Monitor stated "DiChiera overcame Detroit's inferiority complex about the arts by mounting events of national interest," while The New York Daily News proclaimed "Michigan Opera Theatre has become the focal point of a cultural renaissance in Detroit."
DiChiera has garnered honor and recognition abroad and at home by the Detroit city council, the Michigan state legislature, the Michigan Council for the Arts and Cultural Affairs, the University of Detroit Mercy and the governor of Michigan. The Detroit News elected DiChiera "Michiganian of the Year" in 1979, stating "Dr. DiChiera has done more than any single person in the city or state to bring opera to the people." He expanded upon this concept by creating a permanent home for opera in Michigan with the 1996 opening of the Detroit Opera House.
Former Wayne State University chemistry professor A. Paul Schaap, who retired from the university in 2000 to become the full-time president of Lumigen, Inc., will receive an honorary Doctor of Science degree. His bond with Wayne State began more than 30 years ago when he was hired as an assistant professor in the Department of Chemistry. During his tenure, Schaap and his research team developed a novel luminescent compound called, "a 1,2-dioxetane," which can be triggered to produce light in medical tests, known as immunoassays, to provide evidence of certain diseases in patients. The discovery of an efficient light-emitting molecule in 1986 evolved into a compound that is used worldwide to diagnose AIDS, cancer, hepatitis and other diseases. In 1987, this discovery led Schaap to found Lumigen Inc.
May 2010 Commencement Ceremony Schedule:
Thursday, May 6
Ceremony I:
10 a.m. College of Liberal Arts and Sciences
Ceremony II:
2 p.m. College of Liberal Arts and Sciences
Ceremony III:
6 p.m. College of Education
College of Fine, Performing and Communication Arts
Friday, May 7
Ceremony IV:
10 a.m. School of Business Administration
College of Engineering
Ceremony V:
2 p.m. School of Library and Information Science
College of Nursing
Eugene Applebaum College of Pharmacy and Health Sciences
School of Medicine (Ph.D./Master's Degrees)
School of Social Work
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Wayne State University is a premier urban research institution of higher education offering more than 350 academic programs through 13 schools and colleges to nearly 32,000 students.