Events
A one-stop shop for students anticipating graduation - order announcements, buy regalia, find out whom to contact to check on your progress toward graduation, or look at senior rings. Information concerning repayment of student loans will be available.
For students unable to attend the Bear Faire, regalia may be purchased at the Baylor Bookstore. Invitations may be ordered at the Baylor Bookstore or on line at www.jostens.com.
The Fall Bear Faire will be October 28, 2009, from 1-6 p.m. and the event will be held in the Hughes-Dillard Alumni Center on University Parks Drive, near the Law School and Museum.
• SHOUT OUT - A Baylor tradition
The Shout Out video gives each graduating student 30-60 seconds to record a 'Shout Out' to friends and family for their support and love throughout the years. You don't have to dress up, you don't have to have anything prepared, just come and give a Shout Out!
A compilation of these messages will be played as guests are finding their seats in Ferrell Center, preceding the commencement ceremony. It is great for parents and friends to watch as they wait and fun for graduates to make.
FILMING DATE: Filming dates will be from 2-5 p.m. during Fall Bear Faire October 28.
• ALUMNI ASSOCIATION'S GRADUATION CELEBRATIONBaylor University and the Baylor Alumni Association invite all new Baylor graduates and their families to a reception immediately following the Commencement ceremony. The reception, located outside the Ferrell Center, is a great place to meet family, see professors, enjoy refreshments, take photos and sign up for association membership.
• RING OUT/PASSING OF THE KEY
Ring Out and the Passing of the Key is held each Spring prior to May Commencement ceremonies. The date for the 2010 spring ceremony will be announced at the beginning of that semester.
Details and registration for participation in the spring 2010 event will be available at Ring Out.
The Senior Ring Out Ceremony is an annual tradition at Baylor University and was first a part of the Commencement activities in 1927 when the senior class was invited to participate. The symbolic ceremony signifies the passing of the guardianship of the Baylor spirit.
Historically, the ceremony has included primarily women. Graduating senior women, dressed in traditional graduation gowns, pass a chain of ivy to junior women wearing white. Forming a circle near the Baylor bells in Burleson Quadrangle (the smaller bell from Baylor's first campus at Independence, Texas and the larger bell from Waco University where Baylor now exists), the seniors pass the charge of leadership to the next graduating class.
Since 1946, the men of the senior and junior classes have participated in the Passing of the Key ceremony during Ring Out. Senior men are in graduation gowns and junior men are dressed in dark suits. A representative of the senior class, who has been designated the "Custodian" of the key to the box of relics buried under the Centennial monument in the center of Founders Pleasance, passes the key to a junior representative. As with Ring Out, the ceremony symbolizes the binding of classes in loyalty to the traditions of Baylor.
