Walker to speak at IU Bloomington commencement Dec. 21

Conferral of degrees will be led by IU President Myles Brand, assisted by Sharon Brehm, vice president for academic affairs and chancellor of the Bloomington campus, and by the deans of the schools. This will be Brand’s last commencement as IU’s president, before he leaves the university to become president of the National Collegiate Athletic Association.

The Rev. Linda C. Johnson, associate rector of Trinity Episcopal Church in Bloomington, will deliver the invocation. To induct IU’s newest graduates, Fred Eichhorn, president of the IU Board of Trustees, will represent the university. Robert L. Forste Jr., chair of the IU Alumni Association, will represent the alumni. Jacob Steinmetz, a representative of the IU Student Alumni Association, will represent the class. Leading the musical accompaniment will be Gwyn Richards, dean of the IU School of Music, who will lead the graduates in singing the alma mater and the national anthem.

Walker, a faculty member at IU since 1970, led the Office of Research and the University Graduate School through an extraordinary period of change, growth and success. Under his leadership, external research funding at IU has increased from $113 million to $293 million. Several new research centers were created, including the Center for Genomics and Bioinformatics and the Center on Congress. Walker also helped formalize an Office of Technology Transfer, which evolved into the Advanced Research and Technology Institute. (ARTI).

More information about the commencement ceremony is available on the Web.