Commencement volunteers and marchers are invited to support the Class of 2022 as they eagerly anticipate celebrating at the 150th Commencement on Saturday, May 21, in the Sports Arena. Your participation in the most auspicious campus event of the year makes it especially meaningful for our graduates and their families. Please honor them by marching in the procession or serving as a volunteer usher to help with graduate lineup or to greet and guide guests.

Ceremonies by school are as follows:

• 9:00 a.m. Baccalaureate Ceremony: School of Arts and Sciences and Individualized Studies
• 1:00 p.m. Baccalaureate Ceremony: School of Education and School of the Professions
• 5:00 p.m. Graduate School Ceremony: Master's Degrees and Advanced Graduate Certificates

Please visit the Faculty and Staff section of the Commencement website. Registration is online.

• Volunteer ushers registration
• Marchers registration, including all platform party members and administrators, graduate ceremony hooders, marshals, and announcers
• Rehearsals

Regalia rentals are available to order through the Barnes & Noble at Buffalo State Bookstore until Friday, April 8, with regular shipping charges. A limited inventory of doctoral and master’s gowns, caps, and hoods are available for loan through the Academic Affairs Office until Monday, May 9. Please place loan requests early for best options. Rental pricing and the loan request information are provided in the Marcher Regalia Rentals and Loans section of the Commencement website.

Thank you for your dedicated service on Commencement Day.

Please join us for the first speaker in a new series, “Buffalo State Talks,” when Robert Warren, associate professor of biology, presents “Native Trees Link Humans and Nature in Urban Ecosystems” today, April 20, at 6:00 p.m. in the LoRusso Alumni and Visitor Center.

Dr. Warren will cover how, in our green world, not all that is green is fit to eat. Through eons of evolution, plants have evolved to defend themselves from pathogens and animals, using physical and chemical defenses that stop them from being infected or eaten. In a parallel way, plants have developed showy and smelly attractants to lure in friends. Urban landscapes can be challenging habitats for native species, but the infusion of non-native competitors makes them nearly uninhabitable.

Dr. Warren’s talk will be followed by a question-and-answer session. The series is free and open to the public. RSVP at the Buffalo State Talks web page.

Please join us for the first speaker in a new series, “Buffalo State Talks,” when Robert Warren, associate professor of biology, presents “Native Trees Link Humans and Nature in Urban Ecosystems” on Wednesday, April 20, at 6:00 p.m. in the LoRusso Alumni and Visitor Center.

Dr. Warren will cover how, in our green world, not all that is green is fit to eat. Through eons of evolution, plants have evolved to defend themselves from pathogens and animals, using physical and chemical defenses that stop them from being infected or eaten. In a parallel way, plants have developed showy and smelly attractants to lure in friends. Urban landscapes can be challenging habitats for native species, but the infusion of non-native competitors makes them nearly uninhabitable.

Dr. Warren’s talk will be followed by a question-and-answer session. The series is free and open to the public. RSVP at the Buffalo State Talks web page.

Please join us for the first speaker in a new series, “Buffalo State Talks,” when Robert Warren, associate professor of biology, presents “Native Trees Link Humans and Nature in Urban Ecosystems” on Wednesday, April 20, at 6:00 p.m. in the LoRusso Alumni and Visitor Center.

Dr. Warren will cover how, in our green world, not all that is green is fit to eat. Through eons of evolution, plants have evolved to defend themselves from pathogens and animals, using physical and chemical defenses that stop them from being infected or eaten. In a parallel way, plants have developed showy and smelly attractants to lure in friends. Urban landscapes can be challenging habitats for native species, but the infusion of non-native competitors makes them nearly uninhabitable.

Dr. Warren’s talk will be followed by a question-and-answer session. The series is free and open to the public. RSVP at the Buffalo State Talks web page.

Please join us on Monday, April 11, and Tuesday, April 12, for our Women's History Month and Pride Week speaker, Robyn Ochs, an educator, grassroots activist, and editor of Bi Women Quarterly and two anthologies: the 42-country collection Getting Bi: Voices of Bisexuals Around the World and RECOGNIZE: The Voices of Bisexual Men.

Monday, April 11: 4:30 to 6:00 p.m., Caudell Hall 209
Ms. Ochs will present the workshop “Beyond Binaries: Identity and Sexuality”

Tuesday, April 12: 12:15 to 1:30 p.m., Upton Hall 230 
Ms. Ochs will present an interactive keynote talk, “The Changing Landscape of Identity: Understanding LGBTQIA + Identities and Experiences in 2022”

Program descriptions:

Beyond Binaries: How do we assign labels to our complex experiences of identity? In this interactive program, we explore the landscape of sexuality, conduct a thought-provoking anonymous survey of those present, and look together at the data. This program will change the way you think about labels and deconstruct binary systems of identity.

The Changing Landscape of Identity: How are people using and experiencing sexual orientation and gender in 2022? And what do you need to know to be culturally competent in this area? Ms. Ochs will discuss her research with LGBTQ+ teens and young people. Bring your questions and an open mind.

Ms. Ochs is an advocate for the rights of people of all orientations and genders to live safely, openly, and with full access and opportunity. Her work focuses on increasing awareness and understanding of complex identities and mobilizing people to be powerful allies to one another within and across identities and social movements. She was named by Teen Vogue as one of “9 Bisexual Women Who Are Making History.”

These Women's History Month and Pride Week Events are sponsored by the Women and Gender Studies Interdisciplinary Unit and the Equity and Campus Diversity Office and supported by an FSA Founders Fund grant.

SUNY’s current systemwide contract with Blackboard expires December 21, 2022. Following an extensive RFP process, SUNY has selected Desire2Learn’s (D2L) Brightspace learning management system to serve as the new systemwide hub of its digital learning environment.

Here’s your opportunity to obtain early access to a Brightspace sandbox and work with an Instructional Design and Distance Learning team member to explore the new platform.

The Brightspace sandbox is an initial Brightspace environment that can be used to explore the core functionality that will be available in the new learning management system. The purpose of the sandbox is to explore Brightspace from a faculty and student perspective. This is a temporary environment that will look different from the final production environment. For example, the Brightspace sandbox will not have additional third-party or extended functional tools that will be available in production. There will be both in-person and virtual workshops via Microsoft Teams.

Please register using the links below or through the Workshop Registration System.

Tuesday, April 19, noon–2:00 p.m. in Butler 314 

Friday, May 6 11:30 a.m. – 1:30 p.m. in Butler 314   

The following workshops will be held online via Microsoft Teams.

Tuesday, April 26, 12:15 - 1:45 pm
Wednesday, April 27, 6:00 - 7:30 pm
Thursday, April 28, 12:15 - 1:45 pm
Saturday, April 30, 9:30- 11: 00 am

For more information and future offerings of this workshop, please email Jamie Tabone, instructional designer.

The Buffalo State College Alumni Association and Liberty Mutual Insurance Company will offer a defensive driving course for Buffalo State faculty, staff, alumni, and students on Saturday, April 30, from 9:00 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. in Ketchum Hall 106.

Save money on your auto insurance by taking this class offered through Liberty Mutual. Friends and relatives are also welcome if accompanied by a faculty or staff member, alumnus, or student. The discount is 10 percent off liability insurance in New York state, regardless of one’s auto insurance provider; this course will also remove points from your driver’s license. The cost of the class is $25 per person. Masks are required to attend this course.

Attendees should park in lot R-2 or along Rockwell Road and enter Ketchum Hall through the door on the west side of the building (across from Moot Hall). Parking is free and open to the public on Saturdays.

To enroll, please call Damien Lawrence, Buffalo State’s local representative, at (716) 984-9111. The registration deadline for this class is Wednesday, April 27.

Buffalo State College’s spring 2022 “Conversations in and out of the Disciplines” series continues Friday, April 15, when Sue Maguire, associate professor of anthropology, presents “Making Connections: Exploring Interdisciplinary Approaches to Archaeology at Old Fort Niagara, Youngstown, New York.” The talk, followed by a question-and-answer session, will begin at 3:00 p.m. in Ketchum Hall 320. Everyone is welcome.

Please also mark your calendars for the final talk of the semester when Gehan Senthinathan, assistant professor of social and psychological foundations of education and adult education, presents “Sweet Neuroscience: Intermittent Access and Excessive (Addiction-Like) Consumption” on Friday, April 29, at 3:00 p.m. in Ketchum Hall 320. His talk will also be followed by a Q&A.

The “Conversations” series was started over a decade ago by Ann Colley, SUNY Distinguished Professor Emerita of English, to “celebrate and draw attention to the research being done in various departments at Buffalo State College.” Over the last few years, colleagues from Anthropology, Art Conservation, Art History, Biology, English, History, Mathematics, Philosophy, Political Science, and Secondary Education (among others) have shared their work with the Buffalo State and Buffalo communities.

Members of the campus community are invited to enjoy one of two one-hour early morning urban bird-watching tours in Buffalo State College’s beautiful Maud Gordon Holmes Arboretum on Friday, April 15, or Friday, April 22, beginning at 8:00 a.m. Participants will see some of the common and not so common bird species that either reside on or visit our campus. 

KimMarie Markel, academic affairs staff associate and birding enthusiast, will lead these walks, showing the diversity of birds in an urban setting and demonstrating that bird watching can be done throughout the city, including on Buffalo State’s tree-filled campus.

Please email Steven Sypniewski, arboretum manager, to register in advance, indicating interest in either the April 15 or the April 22 tour. Groups will be limited to 12 people per tour.

Registrants, please meet Ms. Markel at 8:00 a.m. on your tour day near the lion statues on the southwest corner of Rockwell Hall; dress for the weather, wear comfortable footwear, and bring binoculars if you have them.

These tours are part of a series of April events sponsored by the Buffalo State College Sustainability Committee in celebration of Earth Day and Arbor Day.

Beyond Boundaries Film and Discussion Series presents Not Going Quietly (2021), a documentary by Nicholas Bruckman, on Thursday, April 14, at 7:00 p.m. in the Burchfield Penney Art Center's Tower Auditorium. There will be a panel discussion after the film.

This award-winning documentary tells the story of 32-year-old Ady Barkan, a rising star in progressive politics and new father whose life is upended when he is diagnosed with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), or Lou Gehrig’s disease.

After a confrontation with powerful Senator Jeff Flake on an airplane goes viral, catapulting him to national fame, Barkan and a motley crew of activists ignite a once-in-a-generation political movement called “Be a Hero.”  Together, they barnstorm the country and empower people to confront their elected officials with emotional, personal stories to demand health-care justice, and Barkan holds groundbreaking interviews with Joe Biden, Kamala Harris, Bernie Sanders, and Elizabeth Warren. Through his journey, Barkan discovers that collective action and speaking truth to power offers hope for his family and millions of others.

Beyond Boundaries is sponsored by the Equity and Campus Diversity Office, the Communication Department, and the Burchfield Penney Art Center. All screenings are held in the Burchfield Penney and are free and open to the public. The series is curated by Ruth Goldman and Meg Knowles, associate professors of media production in the Communication Department.