Sudbury Resident Receives WPI Graduate Degree

From Worcester Polytechnic Institute: Worcester Polytechnic Institute (WPI) began its 149th Commencement celebrations with the graduate students' ceremony on Thursday, May 11, awarding nearly 800 masters and doctoral degrees. Timothy Watts of Sudbury, Mass., was awarded a master of business administration degree.

President Laurie A. Leshin and Board of Trustees Chairman Jack T. Mollen presided over the ceremony, which included the awarding of an honorary doctor of science degree to Audrey Carlan '57, who received the first graduate degree awarded by WPI to a woman-15 years before the first female undergraduates were awarded degrees.

"Today, as I look out at all of you, I am struck most by the amazing potential for breaking new ground that I see here in front of me," said Leshin.

The keynote address was given by Deborah Wince-Smith, president and CEO of the U.S. Council on Competitiveness. Wince-Smith, a key leader in recharging the national debate on competitiveness, innovation, and resilience, also received an honorary doctor of humane letters degree.

Likening the WPI students assembled to the "innovative, hopeful, future-oriented entrepreneurs and industrialists" of Worcester's past, Wince-Smith urged the graduates to use their skills and the "game-changing technologies" in fields such as data science, genetics, biotechnology, and computer science to change the world for the better. "Bestowed with the power of knowledge, you must now embrace the hard work every generation must undertake to improve the human condition."

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