Beginning in December, students will initially be given six tickets for their commencement ceremonies, the university announced on Aug. 10. Students who don't use all of the tickets can return them, and leftover tickets will be redistributed to students who want to bring more than six guests.
After some negative feedback to this announcement, The Daily Gamecock reached out to Jeff Stensland, associate director for public relations, to discuss the reasons for the new policy.
For the most part, USC has not required tickets for commencement, although ticketing for the 2014 ceremony — which featured Vice President Joe Biden as the commencement speaker — was regulated. Stensland said that the new policy is largely designed to ensure that students' families get priority over non-family members of the general public.
"During one of the commencement ceremonies this past May, the Colonial Life Arena came very close to capacity," Stensland said. Given increasing class sizes, the university is concerned with the importance of family members being able to witness their students' graduations.
The logistics of the systems are still being finalized. Stensland said that for the 2014 commencement, graduating seniors collected physical tickets before the ceremony took place.
"Any graduate that needed additional tickets for that ceremony was accommodated," he said.
Varying degrees of frustration with this new policy were expressed through comments on The Daily Gamecock's earlier Facebook post about the changes to commencement. Stensland stressed that the policy is designed to prioritize students' families.
"The committee that developed this recommendation is very aware of the importance of having families share in the joy of commencement," Stensland said.
The other changes both go into effect in May. USC President Harris Pastides will be delivering all commencement speeches, and — rather than its previous slot on Friday afternoon — the College of Information and Communications will hold its ceremony on Saturday morning of the commencement weekend.