Audience Steals Show at UC Davis Law School Commencement

Members of the audience stole the show at the 2015 UC Davis Law School Commencement Ceremony, held at the Robert and Margrit Mondavi Center for the Performing Arts on the UC Davis campus on May 14. The crowd of about 1,800, mainly friends and family, came to celebrate the 200 or so graduates.

The ceremony lasted almost two hours, as the crowd heard speeches from many different speakers, including Dean of the UC Davis Law School Kevin Johnson, student-nominated speaker John Paul Wallis, and even Associate Justice Mariano-Florentino Cuellar of the Supreme Court of California.

“There were parts of the ceremony that felt longer than others, it was really nice to see all the student participation” said Junaid Halani, one of the graduates. In addition to having a student speaker, the ceremony included several performances by a student-organized a Capella group. The ceremony went as planned, except for a few moments of unanticipated crowd participation.

The first moment came when an unidentified member of the audience made a defamatory remark about the U.S. military during student-nominated speaker John Paul Wallis’s speech. Wallis served overseas and mentioned it in his speech as part of an anecdote in which he spoke of the similar responsibilities soldiers and lawyers share ethically, which is when the audience member yelled “How many people did you blow up?!” towards Wallis. The rest of the audience seemed to shift uncomfortably at the comment, but the awkward moment quickly subsided as Wallis continued his speech and the audience member who made the comment quieted down. “I didn’t catch what he said exactly but it felt like it was a comment in the spirit of protesting the Iraq war and it was not appropriate timing or direction” said Laura Dellplain, a member of the audience there to support her boyfriend, who was one of the graduates.

The ceremony progressed normally until the second moment of unanticipated crowd participation. As the graduates began to file on stage two at a time to receive their degrees, some of them brought their children along. The audience seemed to respond well to the playful children on stage, applauding them especially, which was an appropriate way to end the ceremony. Many of the speeches throughout the day not only acknowledged the graduates for their achievements, but also the graduates’ support systems, including friends, family, and children for everything that they did to help the graduates throughout the law school process.

After the ceremony, many in the audience attended a reception in the lobby that spilled out onto the street in front of the Mandavi Center. The audience feasted on complimentary food and drinks while they waited for the graduates. The graduates came out eventually to take pictures with friends and family and to chat with favorite professors one last time.

“It was also nice to see the teachers there. It might’ve been a little nostalgic as well,” Halani said of seeing his professors at the ceremony.

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