MJC plans Inaugural Baccalaureate Degree Commencement Ceremony
Modesto Junior College is celebrating the Class of 2018 Bachelor of Science Degree in Respiratory Care at the Inaugural Baccalaureate Commencement Ceremony on Tuesday, December 18, 2018 at 6 p.m. in the Performing and Media Arts Center Auditorium on East Campus. A reception for the 18 graduates and their guests will be held in the Lobby immediately following the graduation ceremony. Both the ceremony and reception are free and open to the public.
Addressing the Class of 2018 are graduating students Michael Barnes and Pasobphai “Nini” Keovanxat-Nguyen. Soloist Leticia Senechal will sing the national anthem and music by the Con Brio String Quartet also highlights the ceremony.
The graduation program features the presentation of diplomas and pinning of the graduates,
as well as remarks by Steve Collins, interim president of MJC, and representatives
from the California Community Colleges Chancellor’s Office.
Additional dignitaries on the stage include Jennifer Zellet, vice president of Instruction; Albert Alt, vice president of College Administrative Services; Curtis Martin, president of MJC Academic Senate; Yosemite Community College District (YCCD) trustees Leslie Beggs, Darin Gharat, Anne DeMartini and Abe Rojas, and respiratory care faculty members Bonnie Hunt, Janet Fantazia and Richard Dyer.
MJC is one of 15 community colleges in the state chosen to offer a B.S. degree following the signing of SB 850 by Governor Jerry Brown on September 28, 2014, which initiated these pilot programs.
MJC’s hybrid program began in the fall of 2017 with a diverse cohort of newly graduated and seasoned respiratory care practitioners who held Associate degrees in respiratory care and work in hospitals and medical centers located in Modesto, Merced, Stockton, San Francisco and Sacramento. Members of this group returned to college after 2-15 years of practice in the field, completing 40 units in a 15-month program made up of 8-week terms and a total of 124 units to receive a Bachelor of Science degree in Respiratory Care.
Areas of study in the Respiratory Care Baccalaureate Program included management, leadership, research, advanced critical care, advanced pulmonary diagnostics and 12-units upper division general education coursework, and culminated in the students’ completion of a capstone project.
For more information on MJC’s Respiratory Care bachelor’s degree program visit https://www.mjc.edu/instruction/alliedhealth/rcp/bachelordegree or call (209) 575-6914.