Chadron State College awarded degrees Saturday to 72 graduate students from 9 states and 3 foreign countries and to 253 undergraduates from 15 states and Canada. Video of the separate commencement ceremonies will be available online later this week on the CSC YouTube channel at: youtube.com/chadronstatecollege.
CSC alumna Susan Woeppel Salka, president and CEO of one of the nation’s largest health professions placement firms, spoke at the 10:00 bachelor’s degree ceremony.
The 1985 CSC graduate, one of the school’s Distinguish Alumni honorees at last fall’s Homecoming, urged the graduates embrace change and challenges. “If you are scared when you stretch and take on challenges, that is great. That’s when you grow the most.”
Salka told them to take accountability for their mistakes, sharing her own experience with a sizable accounting error early in her career. “I earned more trust from my supervisor because I came clean and owned the problem I had created. You can do the same,” Salka said.
Salka described her original personal and professional goals, then used them to show that while things didn’t always turn out how she had planned, she feels the twists and turns in her life were all meant to be.
One example was the inability to have children. Instead, she and her husband, Scott, adopted a boy and girl from Russia 15 years ago and about four years ago became guardians of one of their son’s school friends.
Salka also showed 3 journals she keeps. “I did it!” records successes, “Stuff Happens” holds stories of unfortunate experiences, and “DNR”…short for Do Not Repeat…chronicles poor decisions she’s made.
She joked that in medicine, her career field, DNR typically stands for Do Not Resuscitate and that either phrase is equally appropriate for her journal…adding that we learn more from adversity and challenges than from easy times.
The speaker at the earlier graduate ceremony was Dr. Charles Butterfield, who is leaving Chadron State for the private sector after leading the school’s rangeland management program the past 14 years.
Butterfield told the degree recipients that they should thank the leaders, teachers and mentors who helped them arrive at this goal while continuing to look forward. “Make a difference. Touch lives. Not just your own. Help others realize their career goals. Leave things a little better than when you got there.”
He pointed out that being in a tough situation often provides the opportunity to develop and display courage, such as the firefighting efforts around Chadron last summer and the many students who leave their home countries thousands of miles away to travel to CSC to further their education.
Butterfield urged the graduates to face and embrace change, and offered them a quote from author and longtime PBS journalist and broadcaster Jim Lehrer about the meaning and importance of their degree.
“A college diploma does not mean that you are educated. Quite the contrary. It means that you have opened up to a perpetual state of ignorance and thus a lifelong hunger for more – more ideas, more knowledge, more good thoughts, more challenges, more of everything.”
The 10:00 commencement also included the latest commissioning of an officer from the Chadron State ROTC program. Jonathan Ries, son of Dr. Tom and Lisa Ries of Rapid City, was officially commissioned as an 2nd Lt in the U-S Army.
Lt Ries is in the Infantry, but will attend Airborne and Ranger school before serving with the Rangers. A commissioning tradition saw Lt Ries given his first salute from Sgt 1st Class Carl Dehling of Chadron and in turn present Dehling with a silver dollar.
One highlight of the weekend occurred between the two ceremonies. As Lindsey Glock of Rising City, who’d just received her Masters degree in Organization Management, headed over to watch her boyfriend, Mike Boardman of Gordon, get his Bachelor’s degree, he surprised her in front of Memorial Hall with a marriage proposal and engagement ring. She accepted.
GRADUATE DEGREES AWARDED
MASTER OF ARTS IN EDUCATION
Bonnie Jane Beckstrom, Chadron, Neb.
Lynette R. BeLknap, Hemingford, Neb.
Bridger Chytka, Hemingford, Neb.
Lorrie Ann Hayes, Franklin, Ohio
Ruth Ann Holland, Benkelman, Neb.
Maria Eloisa Oporto Leiva, Ituzaingo, Argentina
Malinda Linegar, Chadron, Neb.
Jana Lynn Sickler, Kearney, Neb.
Patrick M. Waugh, Chadron, Neb.
ABSENTIA
Wendy L. Hageman, North Platte, Neb.
Amy Lewis, Newcastle, Calif.
Alisha Rebecca Reynolds, Fort Morgan, Colo.
MASTER OF BUSINESS ADMINISTRATION
Michael K. Morrison, Omaha, Neb.
Raghavender Sagar Neradi, Minneapolis, Minn.
Gyanendra Rai, Kathmandu, Nepal
Sherri Clifford Uerling, McCook, Neb.
Ronald L. Weifenbach, Rapid City, S.D.
ABSENTIA
Joshua Michael Borowski, Grand Island, Neb.
Jonathan Clayton Hanger, Owensboro, Ky.
Eman B. Haroun, Burnsville, Minn.
Christopher Alan Himes, Scottsbluff, Neb.
Brady B. Johnson, Rushville, Neb.
Anthony Allen Lewis, Goodyear, Ariz.
Travis E. Ouderkirk, North Platte, Neb.
DECEMBER 2012 GRADUATE
Paul G. Spencer Moreno Valley, Calif.
MASTER OF EDUCATION
Julie Alcorn, Hay Springs, Neb.
Lauren Bauer, Douglas, Wyo.
Veronica Bryant, North Platte, Neb.
Kristen Lee Burnett, Cheyenne, Wyo.
Gina Louise Ferguson, Chadron, Neb.
Jordan D. Haas, Hemingford, Neb.
Nicholas Lamp, Kemmerer, Wyo.
Cortney Larsen, North Platte, Neb.
Colleen Clark Margetts, Chadron, Neb.
Jamie Martin, Morrill, Neb.
James Stephen Miller, Gering, Neb.
Megan L. Pieper, Scottsbluff, Neb.
Dawn D. Pinnt, Chadron, Neb.
Jenifer N. Reisner, Yulee, Fla.
Julie Ann Stephany, Gillette, Wyo.
Marc Wess, Chadron, Neb.
Dawn D. Wheeler, North Platte, Neb.
ABSENTIA
Brian D. Anderson, Rawlins, Wyo.
Derek Jeffrey Bantam, Curtis, Neb.
Justin J. Clark, Gering, Neb.
Shannon L. Corfield, Oshkosh, Neb.
Sean M. Cunningham, Grand Island, Neb.
Victoria Leslie Greet Davis, Kaycee, Wyo.
Pamela Marie Drake, Gothenburg, Neb.
Lance James Howitt, Stuart, Neb.
Loni Hughes Watson, Lincoln, Neb.
Holly L. O’Dell, Rapid City, S.D.
Casey Ryan Parry, Mt. Pleasant, Utah
Gene James Russel, Gering, Neb.
December 2012 graduate
Shireen Sheri Stafford, Casper, Wyo.
MASTER OF SCIENCE IN ORGANIZATIONAL MANAGEMENT
Fatima Noheli Balza Alvarado, Merida, Venezuela
Cassie Jo Drinkwalter, Chadron, Neb.
Lindsey N. Glock, Rising City, Neb.
Nicholas Ray Herrington, Holdrege, Neb.
Jessica Jean Horsley, Basin, Wyo.
Polina Kaniuka Cherkasy, Ukraine
Matthew Ran Lucas, Arnold, Neb.
Jimmy Savala, Fresno, Calif.
Joe Schultz, Alliance, Neb.
Valerie Smith-Hibbert, Yuma, Colo.
Margaret (Peggy) Tanata-Manley, Mitchell, Neb.
Ipek Turkyilmaz, Scottsbluff, Neb.
Luke Wright, Hamlet, Neb.
ABSENTIA
Sandra G. Benson, Bassett, Neb.
Brittney M. Deadmond, Goodyear, Ariz.
Kacie K’Lynn Harris, Aurora, Colo.
Cory David Olson, Denver, Colo.
Adam William Orbell, North Huntington, Pa.
Lacie Ward, Lincoln, Neb.
Janell Willems, Hulett, Wyo.
—Tena L. Cook, Interim Marketing Coordinator