Graduation and Alumni News

First Lady Jill Biden will be George Mason University’s Commencement speaker next month, headlining the May 14 virtual event honoring nearly 9,700 graduates.

Playing football for University of Notre Dame was something Steve Elmer said he could only dream of when he was younger. His talent combined with a scholarship had him playing on the field with a golden helmet as freshman. He became one of the team’s most experienced offensive linemen, having 30 starts to his name.

Growing up in the slums of Cameroon, Joseph Sany said he witnessed urban violence and police oppression regularly. He heard about genocide in Rwanda, and he saw more violence firsthand when he worked with NGOs and visited countries like Liberia and Sierra Leone during civil war.

A few days after Khalid Noor was born in Takhar, Afghanistan, the Taliban seized the province, and his family had to escape to another region on foot. “We were constantly moving from city to another city,” he said. “When one district was taken or collapsed, we had to move to another.” It wasn’t an ideal life, but Noor is motivated to change that for future generations—and he’s negotiating with the Taliban to do so.

This week, the Governor’s Office issued new guidance on how universities could conduct commencement ceremonies this spring based on revised COVID-19 restrictions.

Louie Al-Hashimi is driven by service. It started in high school, he said, when his history teacher encouraged him to get involved in community service and he began volunteering at a local food pantry, supporting road cleanup projects, and organizing school concerts for charity. “That, coupled with my studies, encouraged me to pursue public service,” said Al-Hashimi, who earned his master’s in public administration from George Mason University in 2020. “Having the opportunity to build or facilitate a connection with other people—that’s what I’m drawn to.”

Smialek, a single mother of one daughter, has been juggling parenting, teaching or going to school and her work as an Air National Guard medic for a while.

Earlier this year, Melissa A. Long, a 1995 graduate of George Mason University’s Antonin Scalia Law School, was sworn in as the first Black justice on the Rhode Island Supreme Court.

Mason's Homecoming 2021 celebration kicked off Friday, Feb 5 with the SI2G0 truck at the Tip-Off party, and continued with headliner Tom Felton with a virtual performance on Saturday. Check out homecoming.gmu.edu for more details.

Saskia Popescu has been a go-to consultant for hospitals and the World Health Organization, helping to control infections and prepare for new outbreaks.

On Wednesday, Mason alumna Ariana Freeman spent the day inside the U.S. Capitol Rotunda covering her first presidential inauguration as a broadcast associate for CBS Evening News.