49 Graduate in College of Law Spring Commencement

Fourth District Court of Appeals Judge Marsha Slough drew from the words of Ralph Waldo Emerson to show new graduates on May 14 the importance of remaining true during life’s trials and errors.

In his essay “Self-Reliance,” Emerson compared a person’s actions to a ship’s zigzagging voyage. Slough, serving as keynote speaker for the University of La Verne College of Law 2016 Spring Commencement, asked students to be tolerant and patient with themselves as they proceed through their careers and lives.

“Do not judge your path by a few steps or missteps taken over short timeframes in your life, but rather from afar review your choices and adjustments that you will make and you will see your uniqueness mirrored in the ultimate truth of who you are over time,” Slough said.

The 49 graduates gathered at the University of La Verne Sports Science & Athletics Pavilion on May 14 to receive Juris Doctor and Juris Doctor degrees combined with a Master of Business Administration or Master of Public Administration.

“The full-time students in this group are very special to me because they started the same year I did,” said College of Law Dean Gilbert A. Holmes.

They were the first students to pursue the school’s “La Verne Law Model of Legal Education,” five core concepts that include bar readiness and theory-to-practice curriculum.

“I’m appreciative of their willingness to come into a program that they knew was going to be new and they gave it their all,” Holmes said.