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 United States Senator Robert P. Casey, Jr., will be the guest speaker at Alvernia’s Spring Commencement on Saturday, May 17, the first official event in Alvernia’s 50th anniversary celebration. Senator Casey and the Most Rev. Edward P. Cullen, Bishop of the Allentown Diocese, will both be awarded Doctoral Degrees of Humane Letters. Bishop Cullen will celebrate the Baccalaureate Mass preceding commencement on campus in the Physical Education Center.
This year’s Spring Commencement also marks a new venue for the College. For the first time in the history, commencement will be held off campus in the Reading Eagle Theater of the Sovereign Center in downtown Reading. Commencement begins at 2 p.m. Approximately 370 students across divisions (graduate, undergraduate and evening undergraduate) and campuses will graduate this spring, the largest number ever. “This change of venue will allow more family members to attend commencement,” explained Sister Margaret Anne Dougherty, Vice President of College Life and Student Learning Services. “This is a tribute to our transformational growth as an institution.”
This year Alvernia will confer trustee emeritus status on Janice Miller of Wyomissing, who served on the College Board of Trustees, from 1996-2003. In addition the College will also collectively honor all the Bernardine Franciscan Sisters, more than 40, who served as trustees since the College’s inception, with emeritus status. Sister Margaret Mary Jackson will represent the congregation for the honor.
Bob Casey was elected U.S. Senator from Pennsylvania in 2006. He serves on five Senate committees: Foreign Relations; Agriculture, Nutrition and Forestry; Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs; the Special Committee on Aging; and the Joint Economic Committee.
 Prior to his election to the U.S. Senate, he served eight years as Pennsylvania Auditor General and two years as State Treasurer. Born and raised in Scranton, Pennsylvania, he graduated from The College of the Holy Cross in 1982 and spent the following year teaching fifth grade and coaching eighth grade basketball in inner city Philadelphia for the Jesuit Volunteer Corps. He received his law degree from the Catholic University of America in 1988 and entered the practice of law in Scranton.
The Most Rev. Edward Peter Cullen was ordained a priest in 1962, by His Eminence John Cardinal Krol, then archbishop of Philadelphia, at the Basilica of SS. Peter and Paul in Philadelphia. Then-Monsignor Cullen was consecrated a bishop, as auxiliary bishop of Philadelphia in April of 1994. Bishop Cullen celebrated his tenth anniversary as the Third Bishop of Allentown in 2008.
Besides serving on the Board of Trustees at Alvernia College, Bishop Cullen is a trustee at the Catholic University of America and St. Charles Borromeo Seminary.
For more information about commencement or baccalaureate at Alvernia College, call (888) ALVERNIA.
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