More than 2,000 new graduates will be recognized at Conestoga’s three Fall 2018 convocation ceremonies to be held on Thursday, November 15 at Bingeman’s Conference Centre in Kitchener. Ceremonies will begin at 10:00 a.m., 2:30 p.m. and 6:30 p.m.
David Frazer, 1997 graduate of the Business Administration - Marketing program and now VP, National Accounts at the Manulife Bank of Canada, will address the graduating class at the morning ceremony. Grant Schwartz, 1994 graduate of the Welding/Fitting apprenticeship program, owner and custom metal fabricator at Schwartz Inc., who was featured on the Discovery Network’s Vegas Rat Rods, will address graduates at the afternoon and evening ceremonies.
In conjunction with the ceremonies, a number of college-wide awards will be presented.
Olivia Curtis from Kitchener will receive the 2018 Governor General’s Academic Medal during the morning ceremony. This award is presented each year to the graduating student from a diploma program who has achieved the highest overall academic average. Olivia is graduating from the Recreation and Leisure Services program with an overall average of 96.9 per cent.
At the afternoon ceremony, Thomas Abdallah of Delaware, Ontario, David Eelman of Wingham, Ontario and Stanislav Rashevskyi of Kyiv, Ukraine will be presented with the Fall 2018 Conestoga College Mastercraft award for excellence in program-related technical skills. The team, all graduating from the Bachelor of Engineering in Electronic Systems Engineering, created a robotic air hockey system, a custom-designed high-speed robot that can play air hockey against a human player. The project demonstrates industry-relevant technologies such as object recognition with computer vision, high speed robotic position control, and autonomous control strategies.
Two major awards will be presented at the evening ceremony.
Hanna Close from Beeton, Ontario will receive the 2018 President’s Scholar award for the graduating student who achieves the highest academic grade average for all courses in a degree program. Hanna is graduating from the Bachelor of Applied Health Information Science program with an overall program average of 90.2 per cent.
Justin St-Maurice, a faculty member in Conestoga’s School of Health & Life Sciences, will receive the 2018 Aubrey Hagar Distinguished Teaching award. This award is presented annually to a faculty member who has made an outstanding contribution to teaching and learning at Conestoga. A recent PhD graduate in Systems Design Engineering from the University of Waterloo, Justin joined Conestoga in 2012 and serves as the program coordinator for the Bachelor of Applied Health Information Science program.
For more information, including a full ceremony schedule, visit www.conestogac.on.ca/convocation