Cheers and proud tears for CSUN grads as 2024 commencement ceremonies begin

On Friday, Cal State University Northridge held the first of seven commencement ceremonies to celebrate the adversity overcome, goals obtained and dreams launched by the class of 2024.

The ceremony took place at 6 p.m. with hundreds students in the College of Engineering and Computer Science and the College of Science and Mathematics gathering in front of CSUN’s iconic library.

The crowd was awash in a golden hour glow as the seniors donned their caps and gowns and proud parents donned their sunglasses to hide tears.

The graduates marched in to the jubilant tunes of “Pomp and Circumstance” snapping pictures, waving to the audience and triumphantly thrusting their fists into the air.  Several wore artfully decorated caps bearing messages like “Dios, familia y estudio” and “It always seems impossible until it’s done.”

The commencement began with singing the national anthem and acknowledgement of the indigenous people of California who lived on the land where CSUN now sits. The crowd then watched a video of Fernandeño Tataviam Band of Mission Indians performing traditional tribal songs and conferring their congratulations upon the graduates.

“This is the day that you all worked towards for so many years and that day has finally arrived,” William Watkins, vice president for student affairs and dean of students, told the audience. “Many of you are making history as the first in your family to graduate college, and all of you have worked hard to earn this opportunity to participate in this ceremony this evening.”

CSUN President Erika D. Beck acknowledged that many of the graduating students had never had the experience of crossing the stage and receiving a diploma because their high school graduations were cancelled due to COVID-19.

“So today, we are ready to make up for that loss with all of the pomp and circumstance you can muster because you have earned it two times over,” she said.

“We know that for all of our graduates, arriving at this moment took years of dedication and commitment and experience that unfolded amid a global pandemic, a racial reckoning, and devastating geopolitical and humanitarian crises across the globe,” Beck said. “You showed us all what resilience and determination in the face of challenge looks like.”

For many students making it to the CSUN graduation stage still feels like a miracle.

For Demi De La Vara, who plowed through an unimaginable amount of challenges to make it to graduation, this moment “doesn’t feel real.”

While a student at CSUN, she lost three pregnancies, navigated two abusive relationships, was kicked out of home and experienced a bout of homelessness after her apartment caught on fire. But she never gave up on her education.

A big turning point for her came in 2021, when she went into hemorrhagic and septic shock three weeks after a miscarriage because the doctors failed to remove the placenta. She felt like the doctors didn’t listen to her, which inspired her to change her career plans and become an OB/GYN.

De La Vara is extremely grateful for the support of her advisor, Gladys Garcia, who helped find opportunities to bolster her medical school resume such as completing research in Ecuador as part of the tropical biology semester abroad program. She is also very thankful for her professor Dr. Kayla Kaiser who met with her every Friday to help with lab reports.

“The person that really made it happy is my 18-year-old self. There were three goals that I really wanted: becoming president of a club, to study abroad and to do biochemistry research,” said De La Vara. “I accomplished all those things and I have two biology degrees. I’m very proud of myself for never giving up.”

Nicole Ayala, a first-generation Paraguayan American student from a low-income background, described graduation as “surreal.”

“After four and a half years, I didn’t think I would come this far, especially because there’s so much that my family and I had to endure when we received my dad’s diagnosis of Alzheimer’s,” she said. “I had to basically balance being a student, while also being a daughter, and a caregiver, to someone who I really cared about.”

Ayala received the Outstanding Graduating Senior award at this year’s Honors Convocation, which took place on May 11. She was recognized for her leadership roles in several campus organizations — including CSUN’s Mentor Collective, the Matadors 4 Wellness Education Program, Big Buddies, University Ambassadors Program, TriDelta sorority, medical fraternity Phi Delta Epsilon – and for her commitment to supporting underrepresented communities in healthcare.

Growing up, she navigated many healthcare challenges. At 9, she and her mother were injured in a hit-and-run incident. A year later her mother was diagnosed with breast cancer. And more recently her father developed Alzheimer’s. Ayala is determined to become a primary physician and an advocate for underprivileged communities in the San Fernando Valley

“As a Latina, the majority of our families go through some major health challenge because of the healthcare disparities that we see, so it inspired me to become a physician to go back to my community and serve them with the high-quality health care that they need,” she said.

During Friday’s commencement ceremony, honorary doctorates were conferred upon two accomplished CSUN alumni: Andrew Anagnost, president and CEO of Autodesk Inc. and Robert Taylor, president and CEO of the private equity firm Centinela Capital Partners.

Anagnost grew up in the San Fernando Valley, had trouble focusing in school, and wound up heavily medicated as a result. Despite his less than optimal start to life, he went on to become a C-suite executive of a $47 billion company and leader in architecture, engineering and manufacturing software. He credits much of that success to his time at CSUN.

“At CSUN I met incredibly caring and inspirational educators who invested in me and my future education as an engineer,” Anagnost told the Daily News. “They helped me see what I didn’t see in myself and nurtured my belief in my potential. That early support carried me on to Stanford University and the career I have today.”

Anagnost wants to inspire underserved student populations to pursue STEAM (science, technology, engineering, arts, and mathematics) careers and in 2023 he directed Autodesk to donate $5 million for construction of the Autodesk Technology Engagement Center at CSUN.

“Today, there are many more people from even more challenging backgrounds that need that support and nurturing,” Anagnost said. “We want to help them.”

The center will support the academic programs of the College of Engineering and Computer Science with state-of-the-art research labs for machine fabrication and testing, 3D printing, artificial intelligence, cybersecurity, virtual reality and more. It will also provide a makerspace — a collaborative work space open to the community — so students and their families can use their creativity and learn new technologies.

Taylor also credits CSUN for many of his successes in life and in particular the Minority Engineering Program, which provided him a  mentorship from program founder Raymond Landis, who later became dean of the College of Engineering and Computer Science.

“The same kind of supports are still needed today and I want to do whatever I could for the people who follow me,” Taylor said. “I want it to be easier for the next Robert Taylor.”

After graduating CSUN in 1986, Taylor went to Stanford, where he earned an MBA and a law degree. He then landed a job at McKinsey & Company and quickly climbing the corporate ladder before transitioning into a career in private equity. Today he is one of the most impactful African-American financial industry leaders in California and serves as the as chair of the CSUN Foundation Board.

An estimated 10,924 students — including 8,929 undergraduate and 1,995 graduate students — are eligible for the 2024 commencement.

All seven ceremonies will be livestreamed on the university’s Facebook at https://facebook.com/calstatenorthridge and on YouTube at https://www.youtube.com/user/CalStateNorthridge.

Here are the other commencement ceremonies at CSUN this weekend through Monday:

• Graduates from the departments of Criminology and Justice Studies, Geography, Political Science, Public Administration, Public Sector Management, Social Work, Sociology and Urban Students and Planning in the College of Social and Behavioral Sciences at 8 a.m. on Saturday, May 18.
• Graduates of the Michael D. Eisner College of Education and the graduates from the departments of Africana Studies, Anthropology, History and Psychology in the College of Social and Behavioral Sciences at 6 p.m. on Saturday, May 18.
• Graduates from the College of Humanities and the departments of Communication Disorders, Family and Consumer Sciences, and Kinesiology in the College of Health and Human Development at 8 a.m. on Sunday, May 19.
• Graduates in the Departments of Assisted Technology Studies, Child and Adolescent Development, Environmental and Occupational Health, Health Sciences, Nursing, Physical Therapy and Recreation and Tourism Management in the College of Health and Human Development at 6 p.m. on Sunday, May 19.
• Graduates of the David Nazarian College of Business and Economics at 8 a.m. on Monday, May 20.
• Graduates of the Mike Curb College of Arts, Media, and Communication at 6 p.m. on Monday, May 20.

During the 6 p.m. May 18 ceremony, an honorary Doctor of Humane Letters will be conferred on CSU Trustee Emerita Debra Farar, who has both bachelor’s and master’s degrees in education from CSUN and served as a senior advisor on education policy in the office of then- Lt. Gov. Gray Davis.

During the 8 a.m. May 20 ceremony, an honorary Doctor of Humane Letters will be conferred on David Nazarian, CEO and founder of the private investment firm Nimes Capital, who graduated from CSUN with a bachelor’s degree in business administration. In 2014, he led a successful $25 million fundraising drive for CSUN’s business college, which was named in his honor.

Details on CSUN’s 2024 Commencement: www.csun.edu/commencement

California State University, Northridge, 18111 Nordhoff St. 818-677-2130.