July 27, 2000
SUMMER COMMENCEMENT AT UNIVERSITY PARK, AUG 5
HONORARY DEGREES FOR A HEAD START FOUNDER, JAZZ GREAT
University Park, Pa. — Penn State will hold 2000 summer commencement ceremonies at University Park on Saturday, Aug. 5. An estimated 13 associate, 1,239 baccalaureate and 596 graduate degree students will graduate. Undergraduate ceremonies will begin at 10:30 a.m. in The Bryce Jordan Center and The Graduate School ceremonies will begin at 2:30 p.m. in Eisenhower Auditorium.
Throughout the Penn State system, an estimated 237 students will graduate with associate degrees, 1,417 with baccalaureate degrees, and 756 with graduate degrees, for a University-wide total of 2,410 summer graduates.
At University Park, developmental psychologist Urie Bronfenbrenner and jazz scholar, performer and composer William "Billy" Taylor will be commencement speakers and will receive honorary degrees.
Bronfenbrenner will receive an honorary Doctor of Humane Letters and will be the speaker at the Undergraduate Commencement at 10:30 a.m. Saturday, Aug. 5, in the Bryce Jordan Center. Taylor will receive an honorary Doctor of Fine Arts degree and will speak at The Graduate School Commencement at 2:30 p.m. Saturday, Aug. 5 in Eisenhower Auditorium.
Bronfenbrenner is the Jacob Gould Sherman Professor Emeritus of Human Development and Family Studies and of Psychology at Cornell University. He is internationally known for his ecological theory of human development that has changed the ways many behavioral and social scientists approach the study of human beings and their environments. Bronfenbrenner has also played a key role in the design of developmental programs for children and adults in the United States and was one of the founders of Head Start.
Born in Moscow in 1917, he came to the United States at the age of six. He received bachelors degrees in psychology and music from Cornell University in 1938, and later received his doctoral degree in developmental psychology from the University of Michigan.
Among his publications is "The Ecology of Human Development: Experiments by Nature and Design," published in 1979. He holds six honorary degrees, three of them from European universities, and was the 1985 recipient of the Stanley Hall Award from the American Psychological Association. He has also received the Merrill-Palmer citation in 1971 and the Kurt Lewin Memorial Award from the Society for the Psychological Study of Social Issues in 1997, among others.
Taylor holds the Wilber D. Barrett Chair of Music at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst, is the Duke Ellington Fellow at Yale and advisor for jazz at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts. In a career that has spanned six decades, he has shared his music with people around the world through performance, recordings, lectures, public arts' initiatives and television.
Born in Greenville, N.C., Taylor began playing piano at the age of seven. Following graduation from Virginia State University in 1942, Taylor moved to the jazz capital, New York where his popularity on 52nd street led him to play with Billy Holiday, John Coltrane, and others. Taylor earned a doctoral degree in music at the University of Massachusetts, where he later became a professor of Music.
Taylor has performed at the White House seven times and is one of only three jazz musicians ever appointed to the National Council on the Arts. His contributions to jazz have been recognized with many awards including the National Medal of Arts, two Peabody Awards, an Emmy and the first Certificate of Recognition given by the U.S. Congressional Arts Caucus.
Penn State awards honorary degrees to scholars, performers, artists and practitioners in academic fields, or individuals who have made particularly distinguished contributions to society in areas such as public service, business or government. This year's recipients were nominated by a 15-member faculty committee and approved by President Graham B. Spanier and the Board of Trustees.
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Contact: Amy Neil, Department of Public Information, at (814) 865-7517 or at
