May 4th, 2009

FARMINGTON, ME (May 4, 2009)--University of Maine at Farmington will
celebrate its 156th Commencement ceremony on Saturday, May 16, beginning at
10:30 a.m. There are approximately 468 students in UMF's 2009 graduating class.

UMF's Commencement keynote address will be delivered by Naomi Schalit,
national award-winning journalist and opinion page editor for the Kennebec
Journal and Morning Sentinel. Schalit's investigative and feature news
articles and editorials have appeared in magazines and newspapers around
the country.

Receiving honorary degrees of Doctor of Humane Letters at this year's
ceremony are Ann Arbor, gifted teacher, poet and award-winning
photographer, and her husband John Rosenwald, international scholar, poet
and dramatist. Together they have brought their love of poetry and passion
for international culture to Western Maine. Graduating senior Katharine
Rose Gergosian, a resident of Topsham, will give the student address, and
Theodora J. Kalikow, UMF President, and Allen Berger, UMF Vice President
for Academic Affairs, will confer the degrees. Delivering greetings from
the University of Maine System will be Richard L. Pattenaude, University of
Maine System chancellor, and Jean Flahive, member of the UMS Board of Trustees.

The Commencement ceremony will be held outdoors behind the UMF Olsen
Student Center. Guests of graduates are also welcome to watch the ceremony
live over closed-circuit television in Lincoln Auditorium in the UMF
Roberts Learning Center. Following the ceremony, the University will honor
the new graduates with a reception in South Dining Hall in the Olsen
Student Center.

Keynote Speaker Naomi Schalit--Award Winning Journalist

A national award-winning journalist, Schalit's reporting speaks to the
heart of the concerns of the people in Maine and beyond. She began her
career at the The San Jose Mercury News, in California, and, in the last
two decades, has written for magazines and newspapers around the country.
Schalit has worked as a columnist for the Maine Times and both a reporter
and producer for Maine Public Radio. While at MPR, her far-reaching reports
were also featured on National Public Radio, Public Radio International and
the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation.

Opinion page editor of the Kennebec Journal and Morning Sentinel since
2005, Schalit authored a notable editorial series in 2007 exposing the
growing problem of hunger in Maine. "For I was Hungry," received multiple
awards including, the 2007 Publick Occurrences Award from the New England
Newspaper Association, first place for editorial writing in the 2007
National Sigma Delta Chi Awards, honorable mention in the Anna Quindlen
Award for 2007 and runner-up in the 2007 Casey Journalism Awards. The
series also earned her the inaugural Force for Good Award given by Preble
Street, the Portland homeless and anti-hunger advocacy non-profit organization.

A graduate of Princeton University with a degree in religion and Near
Eastern studies, Schalit attended the Graduate School of Journalism at
University of California, Berkeley.

Schalit's speech for UMF Commencement is entitled, "Please use English--a
plea to new graduates to avoid weasel words, official obfuscation and
education-speak."

Honorary Degree Recipients Ann Arbor and John Rosenwald

UMF is honoring Ann Arbor and her husband John Rosenwald for the literary
and cultural vision and energy they have so generously shared with the
community and the region. Together, they have worked as
poets-in-the-schools as part of the Maine Touring Artists Program; taught
at UMF and for Gold Leaf; served on the Sexual Assault Victims Emergency
Services board, and are responsible for situating the "Beloit Poetry
Journal" here in 2003.

Since growing up in Mexico, Maine, Arbor has worked around the globe as
teacher, writer, and photographer. She is a published poet and has taught
English, creative writing, and English-as-a-Second-Language to a wide range
of students from Mexico, Maine, to several universities in China, where she
served as Foreign Expert. Her prize-winning photographs have been shown or
published in numerous venues overseas and in the U.S., including at the UMF
Gallery.

For over 30 years, Arbor worked on the editorial board of the "Beloit
Poetry Journal" and for decades has been involved with poet Robert Bly's
annual conference on the Great Mother and the New Father. She was also head
basketball and volleyball coach at Beloit College in Wisconsin. She
received her B.A. degree from Assumption College in Massachusetts and her
Master of Arts in Teaching in Secondary English Education from Beloit College.

Rosenwald grew up outside Chicago and has led an international life as
teacher, poet, dramatist, and translator, but he is also deeply engaged in
Western Maine. Currently Professor of English at Beloit College, he was
named Beloit Teacher of the Year in 1996. His poetry has appeared in a
wide range of journals and magazines, and he has given more than 500
readings worldwide. Initially a translator of German, he later took up
Chinese, publishing the first major collection of contemporary Chinese
poets available in the United States in 1989.

Since 1976 he has served on the editorial board of the "Beloit Poetry
Journal," and is currently one of two primary editors. He has also been
involved in the annual Robert Bly conference for more than 30 years. He
has had four Fulbright Fellowships to study abroad and has been a Foreign
Expert at three universities in China. He received his B.A. and M.A.
degrees from the University of Illinois at Champaign-Urbana and his Ph.D.
in Victorian Literature from Duke University.

Student Speaker Katharine Rose Gergosian -- Topsham, Maine

Graduating with a major in secondary education-English, Katharine Rose
Gergosian is an example of leadership in action on the UMF campus. As a
junior, she was named the 2007-2008 George J. Mitchell Peace Scholar in
recognition for her strong academic ability, commitment to community
service, and exceptional leadership skills. As a recipient of the
scholarship, she studied for a semester at the University College, Cork,
Ireland. She has been involved with the new student orientation program,
has mentored youth in the community, was involved in the study of the
campus tobacco policy and active with the UMF Dancers. Additionally,
Gergosian was employed on campus as a residence hall assistant, a security
assistant in the Office of Public Safety and worked as an administrative
coordinator in the UMF admissions office. She is currently fulfilling her
student teaching requirement at Mount Blue High School with the hopes to
teach secondary English at a Maine school after graduation.

Additional Event Details

The outdoor ceremony is free and open to the public. However, in case of
inclement weather, the ceremony will be held inside the UMF Fitness &
Recreation Center. Weather inquiries should be directed to the University
switchboard on the morning of the ceremony, at 207-778-7000. Admission to
the indoor ceremony will be limited to those who have already received
"Fitness and Recreation Center" tickets. Guests of graduates are also
welcome to watch the ceremony live over closed-circuit television in
classrooms in the UMF Education Center and in Lincoln Auditorium and C23,
located in the UMF Roberts Learning Center. The Commencement ceremony will
be broadcast live on Mount Blue TV community access Channel 11, whether the
ceremony is held indoors or outdoors. Videotapes and DVD's of the ceremony
will be available for a small fee from the University's Ferro Alumni
Center, 207-778-7090.

About the University of Maine at Farmington

As Maine's public liberal arts college and first public institution of
higher education, the University of Maine at Farmington offers
undergraduate programs in arts and sciences, teacher education, and human
services; and a recently developed Master of Science in Education program.
With enrollment limited to just 2,000 students, the University of Maine at
Farmington is the same size as many of New England's most selective private
colleges and offers many of the same advantages--yet at an affordable
price. University of Maine at Farmington has built a national reputation
for academic excellence by placing students first and foremost. UMF is one
of just 20 colleges and universities across the nation featured in "Student
Success in College: Creating Conditions That Matter," a book that
identifies schools that serve as models of educational effectiveness.UMF is
also a founding member of COPLAC, the Council of Public Liberal Arts
Colleges, which includes 24 public colleges dedicated to the liberal arts
tradition and quality undergraduate education.

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EDITOR'S NOTE: You will find photo of Naomi Schalit, UMF Commencement
keynote speaker, at
http://www.umf.maine.edu/campus/docs/RP089-059.jpg

Photo Credit: Submitted photo