Student Speaker/Singer Information

Student Singer Guidelines:

Vocalist auditions for our College Commencement National Anthem singers will take place in the spring.  Please return here in mid-April to find a link to request your audition time.  The initial audition will be recorded in Zoom for the committee’s review, and you will be asked to perform a traditional rendition of the National Anthem, a capella.  All three ceremonies (11:00 a.m., 3:00 p.m., and 7:00 p.m.) include the National Anthem, and you may be asked to sing at a single, particular ceremony or more than one of them.  Our singers are part of the Official Party and enter Pauley Pavilion with the Chancellor, Deans and Vice Provost, Keynote, student speakers, and other honored guests (instead of entering with the graduates).  Our singer remains seated onstage for the entire ceremony.  Please reach out to commencement@college.ucla.edu if you have any questions in advance of the auditions.

Please check back in Winter Week 3 for more information.

Student Speaker Guidelines:

Please read this page in its entirety before writing and submitting your student speech for the College Commencement ceremonies in Pauley Pavilion on Friday, June 13, 2024.  To be selected, you must adhere to these guidelines (no exceptions can be made):

  • Include a salutation to the audience being addressed (please note the sample video links below for examples of what is meant by a salutation).

  • Be appropriate for the occasion in its tone, content, and pace of oral delivery.

  • Celebrate the graduation of the Class of 2025 and reflect on the experiences and memories of your shared time at UCLA that are unique for Bruins.

  • Inspire those in attendance to future achievements.

  • Not focus primarily on the individual accomplishments of the speaker – this is an occasion for the speaker to celebrate with their class.

  • Be four (4) minutes or less in duration when delivered in the audition.  Practice delivering your speech as if you are speaking at the Commencement podium. Do not speed read through your speech.

  • Be prepared to deliver the speech by reading it at the podium.  There will be no teleprompter, and all speakers will read their speeches from the prepared binder on the stage.  No speakers will deliver their speeches from memory.

  • Be 625 words or fewer in length (MS Word has a word count feature; all words in the speech must be counted, including the salutation).  Typically successful speeches are between 550 and 600 words.  Any submitted speeches longer than 625 words will be disqualified.

  • Be submitted as the exact text you plan to deliver at the podium (no revisions to your text can be made if your speech is selected, unless they are explicitly approved by the College Commencement Office; in past years, no revisions have been approved).

There will be three speeches selected, and each selected speech will be assigned to a single ceremony (the ceremony times are 11:00 a.m., 3:00 p.m., and 7:00 p.m.).  The speaker assignments to their ceremonies will not change.  If you are NOT available at the ceremony time offered to you, the committee will invite the next highest ranked speaker identified in the selection process to appear at what would have been your time, and unfortunately, you will not be able to speak at the College Commencement.  Being flexible about your ceremony time will raise the chances you will get to speak at one of the College Commencement ceremonies.  At your ceremony, you will be offered a limited number of additional free guest tickets beyond the four (4) that you can reserve through the regular ticketing process.  Your family and friends will be seated in the VIP area, which is adjacent to the Pauley Pavilion stage.

In recent years, we received more than 60 speeches for the first round of decisions, and approximately one-quarter of the speeches submitted were chosen to advance to the recorded Zoom auditions.  Those that do not advance for auditions are not considered further; there is no appeal process if your speech is not selected for audition, and the College Commencement Office will not provide feedback regarding your speech.  Among an amazing Class of 2024, only three graduates will be selected to speak, so the odds of being chosen, even if you submit a strong speech that follows that guidelines, are very, very slim (fewer than 5% of the submitted speeches are delivered at a ceremony).

Typically eliminations occur because the speaker did not follow the guidelines (e.g., the speech was too long; it was clearly written by ChatGPT; it had no salutation; it focused primarily on the speaker and did not sufficiently celebrate the class that was graduating; it was submitted past the deadline).

This guidance was posted in January 2024 to begin a process that culminates with the selection of speakers in late April.  As a consequence, if you plan to submit a speech and you wait until it is too late – perhaps a technical problem prevents you from submitting your speech – the College Commencement Office can make no exceptions for you.  If you are a person who waits until the last minute or is otherwise too busy to write a speech far enough ahead of the deadline to submit the text and be sure it is accepted by the form, the likelihood is that this will not be an opportunity that is right for you.  The College Commencement Office is contacted by students the day after the deadline every year; however, the form shuts off at the deadline, and after that point, no additional submissions will be accepted.  The College Commencement Office makes no exceptions.

The best advice is to:

  • Follow ALL the guidelines above.

  • Practice your speech to ensure that your text not only meets the word length requirement but also the delivery duration requirement.

Please check back in Winter Week 3 for more information.