San Francisco Chronicle: 'People getting taken by ambulance': UC Davis cuts graduation short amid scorching heat

"UC Davis didn't finish its outdoor graduation commencement on Friday after multiple local agencies, including the fire department, urged the university to stop the ceremony. Some 12,500 students and families were baking in scorching heat without easy access to shade, officials said....

"...After three hour,s many students had yet to walk across the stage and receive their diplomas. The university announced just after 11 a.m. it was stopping the ceremony based on health and public safety concerns due to heat.

"Ashley Hicks, a student who attended the ceremony, said she was confused by the university's planning. "It was allotted to between 8 a.m. and 10 a.m. and the procession of students entering into their seats didn't end until 9:30 a.m. An hour and a half of the time was taken up by the procession...."

"...Many parents and family members expressed their concern on social media. 'As a concerned parent, few weeks ago tweeted about bad choice having an outdoor event in CA heat,' @4katluvrs said in a tweet. "This should have been an indoor event like the past years. Split it into am & pm events." "

""The @ucdavis graduation today was an experience," @cchavisd12 said. "I flew cross country to see my sister in law graduate and she didn’t walk. I’m not sure who decided that an outdoor graduation in June was a good idea here…"

""...UC Davis cancelled our graduation!! We were not allowed to walk the stage and told us to go home!!" @JoonKookStyless wrote. "Over 2k students could not walk the stage. This was poor planning from the school and we demand a proper explanation from the school board!!"

"This year marked the first time UC Davis consolidated what used to be seven undergraduate ceremonies, held at University Credit Union Center, into three and moving them to the larger Health Stadium. "The plan was announced in 2019 before the pandemic altered graduation plans in 2020 and 2021," the university said in a press release.

"Students SFGATE spoke to said there was no shade. They said the university ran of water and students and families weren't allowed to bring in their own drinks."

https://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/article/UC-Davis-graduation-canceled-amid-heat-17233868.php

We moved early fall football games to 7pm. Why wouldn’t the event planning folks learn from that and plan an outside summer time graduation to evening? Somebody needs to be fired over this.

They pack 12,000 or more people into Aggie Stadium, don't have enough water, no shade, few benches, and prohibit water from being brought inside by attendees.

The football stadium is an inferno when it gets extremely hot. The heat gets trapped in the sunken bowl and reflected off the artificial turf. We've experienced this before.

What was the thought process to the football stadium from the Pavilion? Was there money to ICA for the football stadium versus money from the Pavilion to campus rec?

Davis High on Friday with a turf field ran a long ceremony at Brown stadium without the same issues. Really not sure of the thought process that made this happen.

It can be very unpleasant and even dangerous sitting in the full sun on a turf field with no shade when the temperature is very hot. Graduation at this time of the year in our area should be later in the evenings or ridiculously early if it is held outside.

I sat on Toomey Field for graduation in 1975 when the temperature went above 100 degrees and it was miserable and I was only wearing shorts and a T-shirt under my gown. It was so hot that everyone just wanted it to get over.

How many six figure salaries concurred on this decision, but never graduated from Davis? (I think it was 109 on my day.)

They could have 1/7 the crowd at Aggie Stadium at 7 AM (not 1/3), and 1/7 at the Pavilion at 8 AM. Same thing at 7 PM.

Why the paranoia about families bringing in water?

Today had its own problems based on reddit and Twitter buzz. Allegedly the university emailed out that there would be NO walking at all, just speeches, in an email at midnight. Then in the morning, after a fair amount of families and students bailed or were considering bailing, the university changed course and announced on social media that they WOULD in fact have students walk starting very early. So there are some livid students talking about how their families didn't bother driving up to Davis because they didn't think their grads would get to walk.

Also anecdotes from this morning said that the students walking took 2+ hours anyway, meaning that the university's original timeline may have always been unrealistic.

I assume it's to prevent alcohol being smuggled in

This sounds like a grade A fudge up, and one that was predictable for anyone who lived through the opening of Aggie Stadium. I can appreciate the challenges of the Pavilion, namely it has become too small for commencement unless you do at least 6 ceremonies (maybe a tough sell for the admins who have to go to all of them), plus add in makeups for 2020 and 2021 boosting numbers. I can also appreciate that some people, maybe grandparents especially, being apprehensive about being in a sold out indoor venue. If this was going to outdoors in June, it should have been under the lights. Or they should have rented Golden 1 Center for the capacity. Historically Davis has read names, but maybe it is time to consider other ways. For example, Stanford does a stadium ceremony with a kind of informal walk in, the speeches, and then they dismiss everyone to small stages setup all over campus on lawns and lecture halls where each department has a more intimate ceremony to read names. Also, maybe time to abandon commencement speakers. We may remember how long they talk but rarely what they say. As far as banning water, I’ve been to several UCD commencements and never remember smuggled booze being a problem. Sounds like a solution searching for a problem.

Well, we made the LA Times... comments not good.

https://m.facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=pfbid02qFgsBmzvTjL23MUwgdDU5AZfjRFu9kJGdo1Uyxiyfbcrn4odjKN4cqhfxxG35Ji8l&id=5863113009&sfnsn=mo&extid=a&mibextid=cffofw

And Black Graduation was held at Mondavi Center.

https://fb.watch/dB6HzdM7jt/

there is something called 'black graduation'? maybe they had the vice chancellor of 'Diversity, Equity & Inclusion' speak.

There sure is. I just looked it up myself.

https://cadss.ucdavis.edu/graduation

I didn’t realize it had been happening for 34 years. I guess it has been kind of a niche event not widely publicized. From what I gather there were a half dozen or so minority groups that held such events this year. I will say that I don’t really understand the purpose of these events, but unto each their own.

Ahhh brings back memories of that first game at Aggie Stadium. If I remember correctly, 40+ attendees got treated for heat exhaustion, we lost to a D2 team, and the turf was so hot that players had to rotate out to cool off their cleats by standing on wet towels. The good old days :lol:

we parked by the cow barns. After walking back, sweating like a horse, my wife said ‘On Monday call and find out how much a donation we need to park in the main lot’

Best money I spent in some time

Yeah, moving it to the stadium was an awful idea. I mean, it's early June. Odds are, even with good weather, it's going to be 80. And as you said, on that field turf it's going to feel much warmer with the sun beating down on it. You're just asking for something bad to happen. Best case scenario is people are pissed off because they've been baking for a couple hours.

I remember going on a tour of the stadium years ago when it was about to open. Wasn't even that warm that day but you could feel the extra heat off the turf and it was noticeably warmer on it.

(To sprinkle a little salt on the wound, we lost to a D2 team that dropped its football program at the end of that season.....)

Coincidentally the artificial turf is being replaced.

https://ucdavisaggies.com/news/2022/6/15/athletics-uc-davis-health-stadium-set-for-new-fieldturf.aspx

this is at least the 3rd if not 4th turf to go down is Aggie Stadium. It seems artificial turf actually has kind of a short lifetime (maybe the intense heat contributes?). If you factored all of the inputs, I’m kind of curious on the overall environmental impact of artificial turf vs well-managed Bermuda.

Ron Gould got a new turf.

I remember having muddy, soggy, shredded turf issues at Toomey back in the D2 days. Someone commented it was a shame that a major agricultural university couldn’t come up with a better grass surface.

Someone in my neighborhood, probably thinking it’s a great water conservation idea, just put in an artificial turf front yard as part of a landscaping overhaul. Be interested in how it affects comfort and temperature around the home. Reportedly the whole project cost $9,000.00.

On the other end of the country and of the weather spectrum a neighbor’s child just graduated from the Naval Academy where commencement was shortened due to inclement weather and a tornado warning.

Finally, just spoke with another neighbor whose child was in the Friday ceremony. Parent ended up in the way too small cooling tent....child did walk before the cancellation. Neighbor said the stories from people shceduled for Saturday were bad. School changed plans with less than half an hour to go and people who did not plan on attending rushed to throw on gowns and attend...though a lot simply skipped it altogether....but the school graciously is waiving the fee for the gowns. Good luck raising contributions from the class of 2022.

Rumor has it that the school is looking at the problems and will try to "mitigate the issues." What does that mean? Why not move indoors? UCD Is thinking about going into Aggie Stadium for the next 10 years for outdoor graduation. I for one don't think this is a good idea.

This whole thing is a total embarrassment. Like i said earlier, somebody needs to get fired. Not 20-20 hindsight. Totally preventable. Sad example of event planning.

absolutely somebody needs to fired. Don’t know who, but total incompetence.

In reading more, the decision to move to the stadium was actually made well before the pandemic. The reasons stated by the university were fewer, larger ceremonies would allow them to procure bigger name speakers, the Pavilion was struggling to schedule everything with a growing number of ceremonies from the professional schools, and a larger venue would allow more tickets per student. The unstated reason was the chancellor having to give 9 addresses over 3 days.

While I appreciate the chancellor apologizing and accepting responsibility—the first time I’ve seen a UCD admin even partially own a mistake, it was ultimately inadequate and of questionable sincerity. Students are saying the communication about the Saturday (2nd) ceremony was conflicting and changing right up to the start of the ceremony, with mumblings from volunteers that the chaos campaign was intentional to dissuade people from coming so they could speed up the ceremony. Other students noted they were only allowed 4 tickets, instead of the 6+ typical at the pavilion. And others questioned how it was ever realistic to have a 2 hour ceremony with 2500 names when the Pavilion ceremonies lasted 2+ hours with only 700 names.

OK just move it back inside or do it at night. End of story. I bet the kids will like to add this “horrible experience that I survived” to their resumes. I am a “survivor” of this great horror. I think we should move on. IMHO

I disagree. Some folks didn't get to walk at all, or got told they wouldn't get to walk and then didn't attend, or didn't have their families get to see them walk because they got inconsistent/wrong messaging from the university. It's shameful, to be blunt, especially since Class of 2022 had a very tough experience with COVID and wildfire closures and such.

If I were in the class of 22, I couldn't see myself donating, joining the alumni association, going to games, anything really if this was my last memory of Davis instead of a day of recognition and celebration.

The kids will look back at their entire UCD experience when reminiscing about their college days. Hey, it was a climate change event and they all relate to that. Yes, it turned out pretty bad, but hey they survived. Now people want to move it to the sac kings venue? None of these students will want that.