Commencement Proper Decorum

The faculty and staff of CCBC congratulate you on your academic success and wish to ensure that the commencement ceremony will be a fitting conclusion to this phase of your education.

We ask your help in making the ceremony a pleasant experience for all by attentively considering the rights and feelings of other participants and guests.

Graduates and guests are asked to turn off all electronic devices. Except to follow directions from the stage, graduates are asked to remain in their seats for the entire ceremony. Movement on the stadium floor is distracting to guests in the stands and is disrespectful to the speakers. Please refrain from loud and raucous behavior.

The commencement ceremony is a traditional academic ritual. To participate in the ceremony, you must wear the appropriate academic regalia and maintain decorum. This means: no signs, fireworks, bottles, beach balls, cans, drugs or alcohol.

Commencement attire

Commencement-day weather can range from rainy and cool to sunny and hot -- sometimes all in the same morning! Students participating in the CCBC commencement ceremony are encouraged to wear occasion- and weather-appropriate clothing beneath their regalia.

Lightweight fabrics are generally a good choice to help avoid becoming overheated. Students should consider wearing low-heeled shoes in order to more easily maneuver the stairs and grassy areas of the ceremony site.

Graduates who do not have proper academic regalia (cap and gown) will not be permitted to process and cross the stage.

Decoration of academic regalia

Graduates may decorate their mortarboards for the commencement ceremony. Embellishments are limited to the graduation cap mortarboard (the square, flat top) only. The academic gown and hood cannot be altered or decorated.

Since commencement is an official academic ceremony, we ask that all decorations be in good taste, be a positive representation of CCBC’s academic programs and community, and be family-friendly. There may be no three-dimensional decorations (items extending up from or hanging down from the mortarboard).

Graduates with mortarboard decorations that do not meet these guidelines may be asked to remove their decorations prior to the ceremony.