Tyler Junior College will award 1,406 degrees and certificates for the spring 2019 semester.
Candidates for graduation will be recognized during spring commencement ceremonies on Friday, May 10, in Wagstaff Gymnasium.
TJC will hold four commencement ceremonies:
- 9 a.m. – School of Engineering, Mathematics & Sciences and Early College High School graduates
- 11:30 a.m. – School of Humanities, Communications & Fine Arts
- 2 p.m. – School of Professional & Technical Programs
- 4:30 p.m. – School of Nursing & Health Sciences
TJC Chancellor and CEO Dr. Mike Metke will confer the degrees and certificates of proficiency and certify the graduates.
This will be Metke’s 12th and final spring commencement at the helm of TJC. The TJC Board of Trustees recently announced that Dr. Juan E. Mejia, TJC president for branch locations and district provost, will succeed Metke as TJC president. Metke’s retirement comes at the end of June and Mejia will take office on July 1.
During the 9 a.m. commencement ceremony, graduates from Early College programs from Tyler and Chapel Hill independent school districts and dual credit programs from Grand Saline High School and Alba-Golden High School will cross the stage to receive Associate of Arts degrees – before they receive their high school diplomas.
Chapel Hill will have 31 graduates, and Tyler ISD will have 84. Chapel Hill Collegiate began in fall 2014 as a collaboration between the school and TJC. Their first cohort of students graduated in May 2018. Tyler ISD began its Early College program in 2015.
Dual credit students from Grand Saline High School will have eight graduates earning TJC degrees on Friday, and Alba-Golden High School will have two.
During the ceremonies, remarks will be given by Tyler Municipal Court Presiding Judge and TJC alumna Amy McCullough.
McCullough, a Tyler native, graduated from TJC in 1981. She credits her experiences in music and theater at TJC for laying the foundation for success and teaching her valuable life lessons that have been helpful in her legal career: taking and giving direction, working as a team player, being prepared to perform—sometimes on short notice.
After finishing her undergraduate degree at the University of Mississippi, she received her master’s degree from Oklahoma University. She later joined Baker and Botts law firm in Houston as a paralegal, a move that led her to pursue her own law degree.
McCullough has served as a prosecutor in the district attorney’s office in Houston and as city attorney for the City of Pearland. After living in California with her family, she and her husband, David, moved to Tyler to raise their two sons. She was appointed as presiding judge in Tyler Municipal Court in 2017.