Trinity College will celebrate the Class of 2025 at the College’s 199th Commencement on Sunday, May 18. The academic procession gets underway on the Long Walk at 10:50 a.m., and the ceremony on the Main Quad begins at 11:00 a.m.
During the procession before the ceremony, graduates continue the Commencement tradition of stepping on The Luther-Roosevelt Long Walk inscription in front of the Fuller Arch at Northam Towers for the first time. The inscription commemorates the visit in June 1918 of former President of the United States Theodore Roosevelt, who delivered an address and received an honorary degree at Commencement.
Connecticut Governor Ned Lamont will deliver this year’s Commencement address and will receive an honorary degree. Also being recognized with honorary degrees are Shabana Basij-Rasikh, School of Leadership Afghanistan co-founder and president, and renowned cancer researcher Joseph M. Connors ’69. Graduating senior Theodora Tatsi ’25 has been selected as the student speaker.
This Commencement marks President Joanne Berger-Sweeney’s last at Trinity after leading the College for 11 years. “It is an honor that Governor Lamont will deliver Trinity College’s 2025 Commencement address,” said Berger-Sweeney. “The governor is a distinguished leader whose exemplary service to the State of Connecticut and support of education has made a difference. I know his wisdom and words will inspire our graduates and the next generation of leaders.”
Thousands of members of the Trinity community—including students, families, alumni, faculty, staff, and guests—are expected to gather as the College awards Bachelor of Arts, Bachelor of Science, and master’s degrees to the graduates.
The Trinity College Trustee Awards for Faculty, Staff, and Students Excellence will be announced during the ceremony, as will the Thomas Church Brownell Prize for Teaching Excellence, which goes to a senior faculty member, and the Dean Arthur H. Hughes Award for Achievement in Teaching, which honors a junior faculty member. Trinity also will announce the Charles A. Dana Research Professorship Award and the Charles A. Dana Research Associate Professorship Award.
Commencement will be held rain or shine on the Main Quad. In the event of extreme weather conditions, the ceremony would be held in the Koeppel Community Sports Center at 175 New Britain Avenue, where indoor seating is limited. If such a move is necessary, details would be communicated via email to the campus community by 7:00 a.m. Sunday and a notice would be posted on Trinity Today and on the College’s home page.
For more information about Commencement Weekend, including a full schedule, click here. To view a live video of Commencement online, beginning at 10:30 a.m. ET on May 18, look for the link on the Trinity College Commencement website. Follow the festivities on social media @TrinityCollege and use #TrinGrad to join the conversation.
About Governor Ned Lamont
Lamont was sworn into office as the 89th governor of Connecticut on January 9, 2019. He began his second term on January 4, 2023. He earned a B.A. in sociology from Harvard College in 1976 and an M.B.A. from the Yale School of Management in 1980. Lamont became involved in public service shortly after college, founding a weekly newspaper in a town hit by the loss of its largest employer.
Later, as a member of both the Greenwich Board of Selectmen and the Board of Estimate and Taxation, Lamont worked in a bipartisan effort to safeguard a multimillion-dollar budget and deliver results for constituents. Lamont also served as chair of the state’s Investment Advisory Council, overseeing a multibillion-dollar state pension fund. He previously served as an adjunct professor of political science and philosophy at Central Connecticut State University, where he helped to found a popular business start-up competition.
About Shabana Basij-Rasikh
Basij-Rasikh is recognized for her work with the School of Leadership Afghanistan, or SOLA, which she co-founded and leads as president. SOLA is the world’s first and only Afghan-led boarding school for Afghan girls.
She drew inspiration from the words of her parents, which she shared during a recent 60 Minutes interview: “You could be forced to leave your home. You could be forced to become a refugee. You could lose any material possession that you have, but the one thing that cannot be taken away from you is your education.”
In 2021, the Taliban’s return to rule in Afghanistan forced SOLA to move from Kabul to the nation of Rwanda, where the school welcomes new students from the Afghan diaspora each year.
About Joseph M. Connors ’69
Connors is recognized for dedicating his professional life to healing. He has focused his clinical and research efforts in the area of lymphoid cancers and on the application of genomic analysis to understanding and optimizing treatment for these diseases.
Now clinical professor emeritus in the Department of Medicine, Division of Medical Oncology, at the University of British Columbia and past clinical director of the BC Cancer Centre for Lymphoid Cancer, Connors is best known for his clinical investigations into the biology and treatment of Hodgkin lymphoma, non-Hodgkin lymphoma, chronic lymphocytic leukemias, and myeloma. He has published more than 500 peer-reviewed scientific articles and dozens of book chapters, and has lectured around the world.
At Trinity, he graduated Phi Beta Kappa with honors with a B.S. in biology. He went on to earn an M.D., cum laude, from Yale University and completed his internship and residency in internal medicine at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He went to Stanford University for a clinical fellowship in medical oncology, then to British Columbia, Canada, where he embarked on a 38-year career targeted at treating and curing cancer.
