<p>sjmom2329, </p>
<p>Graduation was very nice. The weather on Friday was HOT, but fortunately nothing was really planned and we got up there late due to holiday weekend traffic (one bad thing about graduation on a holiday weekend.) On Saturday the weather was really nice. Thunderstorms the previous night ushered in a minor cool front and we had beautiful blue skies for the Saturday event in the stadium. Soledad O’Brien was the guest speaker - not exactly a top tier person from a name recognition perspective, but she gave a nice talk - far better than Wesley Clark from a couple of years ago where he just took his stump speech (Bush is the devil, blah, blah, blah) and added a few words to it to make it into a “graduation speech”. </p>
<p>After the convocation on Saturday they had a President’s reception out on the Arts Quad. They had lines of tables under a huge tent with various snacks (sushi, fruit, cheese & crackers, ice cream, etc.) That was somewhat of a fiasco with thousands and thousands of people trying to work their way to the food. I think that next year they should assign the logistics of food distribution to the senior IE/Operations Research class as a final design project. After that it was time for the Electrical Engineering department ceremony which was a good time for the students to have together to make their farewells to those who will not be coming back next year for grad school.</p>
<p>Sunday morning was the graduation ceremony itself. The best part was the procession of the students into the stadium. It reminded me of the Olympics opening ceremony - the veterinarians were the most colorful with each one carrying a large balloon that looked like a big hand and arm which they waved as the entered the stadium. It took about an hour for all of them to enter but it was actually quite fun - especially seeing some of the zany ways that the students used to identify themselves to the relatives up in the stands - everything from balloons to huge (people-sized) stuffed animals to country flags for some of the international students. Of course, all were using their cell phones to link up with parents, etc. Once all the students and professors had entered, the president gave his speech (Cornell’s tradition is that the president is always the one to give the commencement speech) and then they “graduated” each of the schools as a group. (Prior to the graduation, I thought that I would miss not having each graduate coming up to get their diploma as is done in some smaller school. However, after seeing how boring it was the previous day at the EE ceremony to call each person’s name - and there were only a hundred names - I realized that calling them by groups was far better. I would not have wanted to sit through the calling of hundreds, much less thousands of names.)</p>
<p>Then it was over and time for pictures and champagne. (Note - most majors do their individual ceremonies and diploma distribution at this time at various parts of the campus - with more food and drink.) We just got some pictures in when another thunder storm rolled in so we were very lucky that the storm didn’t hit an hour earlier.</p>
<p>Oh, as far as dress was concerned - as indicated, anything was acceptable. Men wore everything from nice suits to slacks and a spot shirt (and maybe even some more casual than that). I went with the casual slacks and sport shirt on Saturday and then a sports jacket and tie on Sunday - mostly for photo reasons.</p>
<p>odyssey,</p>
<p>As far as hotel rooms, we were told at freshman orientation that if you wanted a hotel room in Ithaca you had better make reservations then. I put my name on the list for the downtown Holiday Inn and then they contacted me the following January expecting me to commit to 3 nights at something like $325 per night. I figured that $1,000 was a bit steep so I deferred. Instead we ended up in the Holiday Inn in Cortland (about a 25 minute drive). It worked out quite well. We only had to commit to 2 nights and the rate per night was something like $165 plus taxes. The outside of it looks quite dumpy but they have renovated the inside with new carpets, furniture, drapes and bathrooms so it was quite acceptable. They claim that they will now work on renovating the outside. They do not accept reservations for graduation until the September prior to the event, so you still have some time.</p>
<p>However, others we know reserved in Cortland 3 years ago - and they were required to take 3 nights. They did get a nice stuffed bear with a Cornell graduation T-shirt out of the deal, however.</p>
<p>Another thing to consider well in advance of graduation is dinner reservations. Some of the better places book up when they start taking reservations on January 2 of the year of graduation.</p>
<p>One thing that you might consider to identify yourself to your son is to carry something unique that you can wave. It is really hard for the graduates to look up into a sea of people and pick out individuals so that they can wave to you. Something as simple as an American flag would help.</p>
<p>Once again, thanks to all for your congratulations. It really was a very nice time but the emotional impact of it did not hit me until the drive home later on Sunday. It’s hard to believe that those 4 years went by so quickly. It seems like just a year ago we were going out looking at colleges.</p>