WARSAW ─ Ivy Tech Community College will confer 1,972 degrees and certificates at its 2018 commencement for the South Bend-Elkhart and Warsaw campuses at 6 p.m. Friday, May 11, inside Purcell Pavilion at the University of Notre Dame’s Joyce Center.

Doran Moreland, executive director of statewide diversity & community outreach at Ivy Tech, will be the ceremony’s featured speaker. South Bend-Elkhart Chancellor Thomas Coley also will deliver remarks.

Radharani Buenrostro Magallon will receive the Distinguished Graduate award ─ an honor based on academic achievement, integrity and leadership. The 27-year-old business administration major played a vital role in forming the Latino Student Alliance at the Elkhart County campus. She served in the president’s role for LSA and the Beta Beta Alpha chapter of Phi Theta Kappa. Buenrostro Magallon was chosen as the flag bearer at PTK’s 100 anniversary convention.

Kenneth Pletcher will receive an honorary degree. His support of Ivy Tech spans 30 years, including serving on the committee that identified the location for the campus in Elkhart County. Pletcher served on the resource development committee and provided financial support in helping to connect the college with area businesses and industry leaders. 

The college will award a posthumous degree to the family of David Gillespie, who unfortunately passed away during spring semester. Gillespie was a student at the Warsaw campus. His mother, Sue Days, will be handed Gillespie’s associate degree in machine tool technology in his honor.

Of the nearly 2,000 degrees and certificates to be conferred, 318 of them will be received by local high school students who earned college credentials through the college’s dual credit courses. This year’s total of completers more than doubled from 2017.