Hundreds of grads celebrate winter graduation

HOUGHTON — With degrees in hand, hundreds of Michigan Tech graduates are moving on. ABC 10’s Rick Allen has more.

Nearly 400 Michigan Tech graduates have all the rights, privileges and honors pertaining therein after receiving their degrees at this year’s Winter Commencement Saturday.

Class of 1968’s Townsend Porter, Junior, a pioneer in electrical engineering at the start of the computer age for IBM…was the commencement speaker. Graduating with a double–major in biomedical and mechanical engineering. Minnesota native Ellie Furmanski was the student speaker.

But not all of the graduates at Michigan Tech focus on engineering.

Sound Design Major Courtney Schumaker said, “There’s a certain amount of striving for excellence that happens here and that’s always something that I’ve been about, so I wanted to come here specifically for that.”

While trendier schools may be more appealing to future sound designers, A Michigan Tech education gives an advantage those other students won’t have.

Schumaker said, “Their about the art form, and that’s really great, but you don’t get to learn a lot about the equipment and how it works and how to fix it if it’s broken. That’s something that you really learn here. You really learn the technical side, in addition to the artsy side.”

With a 95% job placement rating for Michigan Tech graduates, the Winter Class of 2015 now embarks on their new careers.