Scenes From Commencement 2024

It was a joyful day for the Suffolk University community as students, faculty and staff, and loved ones celebrated Commencement 2024 at Boston's Leader Bank Pavilion. 

Suffolk Law School, 5:30 p.m.

Law school has a reputation for being competitive, even cutthroat, but that was the exact opposite of Jasmine DeBettencourt’s impressions upon visiting Suffolk University Law School. 

For DeBettencourt, who got her undergraduate degree at the University of Tampa, Boston was much bigger, not to mention colder. “But I toured it and it just kind of felt like home,” she said. “I loved it, the class sizes and the connection to everyone around us (the school).”

DeBettencourt was among 438 graduates receiving law degrees at Suffolk University’s 2024 Commencement ceremonies May 19 at the Leader Bank Pavilion in Boston. She wore four separate cords for her honors and societies, including the Marshall-Brennan Constitutional Literacy Project, women’s law, family and children’s law society, and the Federalist  Society.  She will go to work at a local education law firm after graduation, she said. 

Before the ceremony, Andrea Campos and Herlande Jasmin stood in line together, both wearing colorful “Black Lawyers Matter” stoles in addition to the Law School’s traditional black robe and purple trim.

Campos said her immediate post-graduate plans are to work in the corporate world doing transactional law. She also said she would look back on law school with fondness. “I chose Suffolk because it was close to home and one of the best law schools in the area, but I really like the culture here.” 

Jasmin too, said something clicked for her. “I love the Suffolk community. I felt like I belonged there.”

Zita Zeng, said she felt welcomed in Boston from the start of her law school experience. Now that she is closing that chapter, she elected to wear a traditional Mandarin intricately embroidered stole and collar over her robes as a salute to her family–her father had traveled from China, and another friend came from London, to watch her march on Sunday evening. She completed her degree with a business law and finance concentration with pro bono honors, and will likely take a job either in Boston or California, she said. 

Applause erupted throughout the Pavilion as Zita Zeng walked across the stage, receiving the last of 2,013 degrees conferred by the University today.

College of Arts & Sciences, 1:30 p.m.

Samantha Kelly Linder was on the brink of a proud moment: becoming a Double Ram.

She was among the 730 students of Suffolk University’s College of Arts & Sciences eagerly awaiting the 2024 Commencement exercises on the afternoon of May 19. By the end of the ceremony, she would add a master’s in mental health counseling to her CV. A post-graduation job as a counselor at the Cambridge Eating Disorder Center already awaited her.

As a tongue-in-cheek salute to her undergraduate and graduate degrees in psychology, she had decorated her cap with flowers and the message, “No great mind has ever existed without a touch of madness.”

Suffolk has been her home these past six years, said Linder, who hails from Coral Gables, Florida. “I wanted to stay [at Suffolk for graduate school] because of my network of professors and my connections to all the people here. It’s a real community of belongingness.”

Jorie Kyle, who was graduating cum laude with a double major in English and law, said her eventual goals were to attend law school or possibly pursue graduate studies in English. Favorite Suffolk memory? “Everyone saying, ‘Boston is my campus,’” the Wareham native said.

Cesar Guzman, of Austin, Texas, a psychology major, owns his own videography business and expects to work for a few years before graduate school. “I wasn’t even going to go to college,” Guzman said. “I moved to Boston when I was 17. I was working and I walked by the campus every day. Some friends talked me into applying, and here I am graduating.” 

Nicholas Zujus, a graphic design major from Connecticut was graduating summa cum laude, after a five-mile-run in the rain earlier that morning at neighboring Harpoon Fest on the Seaport. A lover of Boston sports culture, he hopes to find a job as a designer for a sports team. 

At 26, he credited his academic success to the maturity that comes with having been in the workforce for several years before completing his degree, plus a dose of patience and humor. With the last name of Zujus, he noted that he would be the final CAS graduate to walk across the stage. “I’m used to it,” he joked.

Sawyer Business School, 9 a.m.

Alex Grenier spent six years serving in the US Coast Guard before deciding to enroll at Suffolk because of its reputation as a veteran-friendly school. Today, he graduates with a BSBA in data analytics and a plan to obtain an MBA in supply-chain operations and work in the defense industry.

“The rain is not going to stop us,” said Grenier, who hails from Winslow, Maine. “My family is here. Suffolk has been a wonderful experience.”

Lynn native Jenfry Guerrero-Cuevas, graduating magna cum laude with a BSBA in finance, said he chose Suffolk for its city location and his hope it would offer “lots of opportunity, which is exactly what happened.” He completed several internships, including one at Boston consulting firm NorthBridge Partners. 

They were among the 380 undergraduates at the Sawyer Business School ceremony, which also saw 383 students receive graduate degrees.

“I am so excited to be graduating, but I will really miss being a Suffolk student and all the connections I have made from the past few years,” said Anem Haider, an accounting major who decorated her cap with flowers, beads, and the motto “On my way to a CPA,” and proudly wore a 1913 Celebration stole, which celebrates the accomplishments of students of color. “But,” she said, “I may be coming back for grad school!”

Connor Mudge, from Dedham, Massachusetts, received a rousing round of applause from the crowd of nearly 5,000 classmates and their friends and families after he sang the national anthem for the crowd. The cum laude graduate in finance and global business hopes to soon start work as a financial advisor. “I want to help people with their finances, and to be more financially secure in the future,” said Mudge. 

It wasn’t lost on Cristina Castillo that, despite the cold and rain, today was special for this graduating class. “We didn’t have a graduation in 2020,” she explained. Her global business and marketing degree will take her back to her native El Salvador for the summer before she pursues a graduate degree in marketing at Boston University. 

Castillo summed up her feelings—and those of many of her fellow graduates—with an exclamation: “Let’s go Rams!”