|
SCHENECTADY - Union Graduate
College held its commencement
today, with the awarding of 186 master's degrees at the Memorial Chapel on
the Schenectady
campus.
Degrees were
awarded from the Schools of Management, Education, Engineering and Computer
Science, as well as the Center for Bioethics and Clinical Leadership, a
partnership with the Mount Sinai School of Medicine.
Dr. James Mandell, president and CEO of Children's Hospital
Boston, and former dean of Albany Medical College
and a Union Graduate College
alumnus was a featured speaker.
Graduate Ellena Bennett, who just two years ago was planning her
own funeral, also spoke.
A Seattle native who was orphaned as a
toddler, she was diagnosed with melanoma at age 10 and gastrointestinal
cancer in her college sophomore year.
By age 25, she
felt helpless and angry, as her body deteriorated and she saw herself
slowly dying. She said she decided to come to Union because it was
affiliated with Mount Sinai Medical Center
in New York City - whose physicians were
committed to saving her - and because Union's
online program would allow her to continue her education from home and the
hospital.
Despite being
diagnosed last year with yet another cancer, she attained her goal,
graduating with a master's degree in bioethics. Her last round of treatment
was nine months ago, she said.
Bennett, 27, now
hopes to earn a Ph.D. in philosophy at University of Albany
with the goal of a teaching career at a medical college. Her personal
experiences will "help me change things from the inside out,"
specifically better equipping medical caregivers to deal with their
patients' end-of-life decision-making.
"I wanted to
take my painful life lessons of building my own casket, being orphaned as a
child and struggling with cancer, and apply them to ethical issues in
patient care," she said in her address. "I wanted to change the
cold, sterile environment that I felt at the bedside. I wanted to change
the world in what time I had remaining."
At 10 a.m. Sunday,
Union College
undergraduates receive their degrees at the Library
Plaza at the Schenectady campus.
|
