July 31, 2000
Ceremonies to Mark Middlebury College
2000 Language Schools Commencement on Aug. 11
Carillon Concert and Ceremonies Open to the Public
MIDDLEBURY, Vt.-The Middlebury College Language Schools will conduct
commencement exercises on Friday, Aug. 11 at 8 p.m. The ceremonies will
be preceded by a carillon recital beginning at 7 p.m. The public is invited
to attend the recital and the commencement exercises. Both events will
be held in Middlebury College’s Mead Memorial Chapel on Hepburn Road off
College Street (Route 125).
President John M. McCardell, Jr. and Dean of the Language Schools and
Schools Abroad Michael R. Katz will award degrees to 145 master of arts
candidates in French, German, Italian, Russian, and Spanish. He also will
award degrees to three doctor of modern language candidates. Twelve bachelor’s
degrees will be conferred. The ceremony will include the presentation of
outstanding achievement awards in the study of Arabic, Chinese, and Japanese
languages, and for French literary studies.
The commencement address will be delivered by the Hon. Ruth A. Davis, director
of the Foreign Service Institute in Washington, D.C., and former ambassador
to the Republic of Benin (1992-1995). A member of the Foreign Service since
1969, she has served in United States embassies in Zaire, Kenya, Japan, Italy,
and Spain.
Born in Phoenix, Ariz., in 1943, Davis graduated magna cum laude from Spelman
College and earned a master’s degree in social work from the University of California
at Berkeley. She speaks French and German, and has directed activities at the
Foreign Service Institute since July 1997.
Davis will receive an honorary doctor of laws degree from Middlebury
College.
An honorary doctor of arts will be conferred upon the Italian film director
Francesco Rosi, who is credited as the father of the “Cinema Civile”
movement. Rosi’s 1980 film “Tre Frateli” (“Three Brothers”)
was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Foreign Film. Five of his
films, including “La Tregua” (“The Truce”) in 1996,
have received the David di Donatelli Prize for best Italian film.
A bagpipe player, Peter Welch of Marstons Mills, Mass., will escort the
academic procession into Mead Chapel.
Middlebury College’s first language school, the German School, was founded
in 1915, followed by the French and Spanish Schools in 1916 and 1917, respectively.
Subsequently, programs were added in Italian, Russian, Chinese, Japanese,
and Arabic.
Middlebury also offers language programs at the C.V. Starr-Middlebury
Schools Abroad located in France (Paris), Germany (Mainz), Italy (Florence),
Russia (Irkutsk, Moscow, Voronezh, and Yaroslavl), and Spain (Getafe, Logroño,
Madrid, and Segovia). More than 35,000 students have attended the Language
Schools in their 85-year history, of which over 11,000 have obtained advanced
degrees in one or more of the eight foreign languages offered.
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