Butterfield Stadium, Commencement Regalia, and Honorary Degree Recipients May 2017/2018, Ithaca College

Ithaca College Commencement is always festive and, well...gay! Many of our LGBTQ and allied graduating seniors sport rainbow honor cords, recognizing their accomplishments, their history and their culture. Our LGBTQ students receiving Masters and Doctoral degrees proudly wear graduation stoles emblazoned with rainbow colors. In 2018, many Ithaca College Board of Trustees members and other members of the platform party donned rainbow stoles to show their support for our LGBTQ students as well.

In 2017, President Tom Rochon conferred an honorary degree to Ann Thompson Cook, advocate for lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer rights in religious communities and co–founder of Many Voices: A Black Church Movement for LGBTQ Justice. He also conferred an honorary degree to La June Montgomery Tabron, who serves as the first female and first African–American president and CEO of the W.K. Kellogg Foundation. Montgomery Tabron also works to advance racial equality.

In 2018, President Shirley M. Collado awarded honorary Doctor of Letters degrees at the ceremony to Mara Keisling, founder and executive director of the National Center for Transgender Equality, along with educator and civil rights advocate Gloria Hobbs and Daniel Weiss, president and chief executive officer of the Metropolitan Museum of Art.