Contact: Jonathan P. Kraatz at (409) 845-4600 or at [email protected]. 05/06/99
COLLEGE STATION - Former President George Bush, Lt. Gov. Rick Perry and State Agriculture Commissioner Susan Combs will be the speakers at Texas A&M University's three spring commencement exercises May 14-15 for approximately 4,500 graduates. President Bush will address engineering and liberal arts graduates, and graduates of the College of Medicine other than those receiving Doctor of Medicine (MD) degrees, at 2 p.m. Friday, May 14.
Agriculture Commissioner Combs will be the speaker at a 7:30 p.m. commencement ceremony that same day. She will speak to architecture and business administration graduates, and veterinary medicine graduates other than those receiving Doctor of Veterinary Medicine (DVM) degrees.
Lt. Gov. Perry, a 1972 Texas A&M graduate, will address agriculture, education, geosciences and science graduates at 9 a.m. Saturday, May 15.
The university has to hold three commencement exercises to accommodate the large number of undergraduate and graduate degree recipients and their families and friends. All three ceremonies will be held in Reed Arena.
Degree candidates will receive 10 tickets to the ceremony in which they participate. If additional tickets are available, they will be distributed through the box office at the Memorial Student Center.
DVM degree recipients will be awarded their diplomas in separate ceremonies at 10 a.m. Friday, May 14, in Rudder Auditorium. MD degrees will be awarded at 2 p.m. June 5, also in Rudder Auditorium. Lester M. Crawford, D.V.M. will be the commencement speaker.
For additional ticket information, contact the MSC Box Office at (409) 845-1234 or toll-free at (888) 890-5667.
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See attached background on the speakers.
The Honorable George Bush
The Honorable George Bush, the forty-first President of the United States, has remained active nationally and internationally since leaving the country's highest office in January of 1993. He is thus continuing a long and illustrious career of service and involvement in national and global affairs. President Bush's many activities include involvement in several programs and events at Texas A&M University, particularly at the presidential library that bears his name and at the adjacent George Bush School of Government and Public Service. Among his numerous activities, he is chairman of the Eisenhower Exchange Fellowships, honorary chairman of the Points of Light Foundation and serves on the Board of Visitors of the M. D. Anderson Cancer Center in Houston.
The Honorable Rick Perry
The Honorable Rick Perry, a 1972 graduate of Texas A&M University, is the Lieutenant Governor of Texas. He assumed the state's second-highest office on January 19, 1999, after serving for eight years as Texas Commissioner of Agriculture. He served three terms in the Texas House of Representatives on the key House Appropriations Committee and Calendars Committee. In 1989, The Dallas Morning News named him one of the state's most effective legislators. A fifth-generation Texan, Lieutenant Governor Perry is a native of Paint Creek. He grew up on his family's farm in Haskell County and returned there following a tour of duty in the Air Force. He was a C-130 pilot for four and one-half years and earned the rank of captain.
The Honorable Susan Combs
The Honorable Susan Combs, a fourth-generation rancher, was sworn into office in 1999 as the state's tenth Commissioner of Agriculture. She is the first woman ever to hold this position. Commissioner Combs has a cow-calf operation on her family's 100-year-old ranch in Brewster County. She received her law degree from The University of Texas School of Law and is a former assistant district attorney in Dallas. She served in the Texas Legislature from 1993 to 1996. She wrote the state's major private property rights legislation and was a member of the House Committees on Natural Resources and Criminal Jurisprudence. In 1996, she joined the staff of U.S. Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison and worked as the Senator's state director. Commissioner Combs currently serves on the boards of directors of the Texas and Southwestern Cattle Raisers Association and the Texas Wildlife Association. She has also served on the boards of directors of the Texas Beef Council and the Texas Production Credit Association. She is a member of the Texas Farm Bureau and the Independent Cattlemen's Association of Texas.
Lester M. Crawford Dr. Lester M. Crawford was named director of the Georgetown University Center for Food and Nutrition Policy on July 1, 1997. He had served as executive director of the Association of American Veterinary Medical Colleges (1993-1997) and, earlier, as executive vice president of the National Food Processors Association (1991-1993). From 1987-1991 he was administrator of the Food Safety and Inspection Service, U.S. Department of Agriculture. He also served as chairman of the National Advisory Committee on Microbiology Criteria for Foods (Food Safety) and as vice-chairman of the Codex Alimentarius Commission of the United Nations. Before that he served as director of the Center for Veterinary Medicine at the Food and Drug Administration and in various positions at the University of Georgia includign head, Department of Physiology-Pharmacology. Early in his career, Dr. Crawford worked in research and development at American Cyanamid Company and in private veterinary medical practice. Dr. Crawford holds the doctor of veterinary medicine degree from Auburn University, 1963, the Ph.D. in pharmacology from the University of Georgia, 1969, and an honorary doctorate from Budapest, 1987. He is the author of more than 100 scientific papers and the co-author of three books.
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