Graduates ‘sad’ as university drops names from ceremony

STUDENTS were left dismayed after learning that they were not to be called up on stage by name at their graduation ceremonies – as their university blamed the pandemic.

The University of Southampton told its students there were too many people graduating for each of them to be called up by name to collect their degree as it was forced to condense all its lockdown graduations for 2020 and last year into this year’s ceremony.

As a consequence, this week’s ceremony was moved from its usual location on the main Highfield Campus, to the St Mary’s football stadium in the city centre and, rather than being assigned specific seats, graduates were told they could sit anywhere within set zones with their course mates.

An official read out each course’s title, and all graduates from that subject walked up, one by one, in any order, across the stage. They then posed in front of a blue photography background on the stage.

To compensate for the lack of names being called out, there was a scrolling list of names from everyone in that course, shown at the bottom of a screen.

It was predicted that more than 11,000 students would attend ceremonies across three days this week, a spokesman for the university said.

One Southampton graduate said she was “really sad” to not have her name called out.

“I understand it was busy and a lot of people,” she said, but she feels “let down to miss such an important part of graduating”.

Another said: “Not sure why I waited a year for this.”

A University of Southampton spokesman said: “Regretfully, in 2020 and 2021, we couldn’t hold our graduation ceremonies in person, due to the Covid19 pandemic, but this year we were determined to make sure all those who missed out on an in-person ceremony would have the opportunity to experience this, alongside those graduating this year.”