{"id":9611,"date":"2024-04-27T16:07:05","date_gmt":"2024-04-27T16:07:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/ng\/?p=9611"},"modified":"2024-09-04T13:30:52","modified_gmt":"2024-09-04T13:30:52","slug":"university-of-maryland-global-campus-celebrates-graduates-75-years-in-europe-at-ramstein-commencement","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/ng\/2024\/04\/27\/university-of-maryland-global-campus-celebrates-graduates-75-years-in-europe-at-ramstein-commencement\/","title":{"rendered":"University of Maryland Global Campus celebrates graduates, 75 years in Europe at Ramstein commencement"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Story by Jennifer H. Svan<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Army
Army National Guard Spc. Jennifer Egbe is the first soldier deployed to Powidz Air Base in Poland to attend University of Maryland Global Campus Europe graduation ceremonies. The school held its spring commencement on Saturday, April 27, 2024, at Ramstein Air Base, Germany. Egbe, who earned a bachelor\u2019s in communications, drove to Germany from Poland for the event, with six fellow guardsmen who came to show their support. (Jennifer H. Svan\/Stars and Stripes)<\/sup><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

RAMSTEIN AIR BASE, Germany \u2013 When Jennifer Egbe deployed to Poland in January, she was 18 credits shy of earning her bachelor\u2019s degree. The Army National Guard supply specialist and communications major enrolled in the University of Maryland Global Campus Europe. From her barracks at Powidz Air Base, a key logistics hub near NATO\u2019s eastern flank, Egbe finished her online classes with a mobile hotspot connection and earned a spot in the UMGC Europe class of 2024. Egbe and six of her fellow guardsmen piled into a van and made the 10-hour drive to Ramstein so Egbe could receive her diploma in person at the university\u2019s spring commencement Saturday at the Ramstein Officers\u2019 Club. \u201cI wasn\u2019t ever planning on getting to walk the stage,\u201d Egbe said. \u201cThis whole experience has been amazing for me, getting to be at a real graduation in Germany.\u201d

Egbe, 23, was the first U.S. soldier deployed to Powidz to attend UMGC Europe graduation, school officials said. She was among 250 graduates to don a cap and gown and file into a large ballroom for commencement exercises before Maryland faculty and family members. About 1,100 students from across Europe, North Africa and the Middle East earned associate\u2019s, bachelor\u2019s or master\u2019s degrees this year, with some attending local graduation ceremonies in Italy, Spain, England and Bavaria, UMGC officials said. The university\u2019s footprint in Europe dates back 75 years, an enduring milestone celebrated on Saturday. \u201cI doubt many could have foreseen what would come of seven daring professors hopping a plane to allied-occupied Germany in the fall of 1949, armed only with satchels of books,\u201d said Jay Perman, University System of Maryland chancellor, in his keynote address.

It was the beginning of a legacy \u201cfounded on serving those who serve us, those who safeguard our civil liberties and our freedom,\u201d he said.

The first classes were taught at six different sites in Germany, said Rosemary Hoffmann, a UMGC assistant archivist. Many in the U.S. military officer corps were only high school graduates, she said, and had first dibs on courses such as military history, writing and speech. The university didn\u2019t know how many might show up, telling the professors if less than 300 students turned up, they were to return, Hoffmann said. \u201cThey got 1,800 students, just like that.\u201d

William Wood, who sits on the university\u2019s board of regents, recalls attending school in the mid-1950s at the former Frankfurt American High School while his Army lieutenant colonel father took Maryland night classes at the same school. Wood, 84, said his initials are still carved into the bomb shelter in the backyard of his family\u2019s former home. UMGC \u201chas been around a very long time,\u201d he said Saturday. Some 12,000 military personnel, civilians, contractors and family members took classes this year from UMGC Europe, according to school officials. But active-duty service members continue to seek UMGC degrees while serving from far-flung locations. About 62% of this year\u2019s graduates in Europe are active duty. About 100 earned a degree while deployed to Poland, Bahrain, Djibouti, Kuwait, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and other places, officials said.

Chief Warrant Officer 3 Kerly LaBranche, a computer science major, recalled logging into class from a tent during a field exercise at Camp Aachen in Grafenwoehr, where he\u2019s stationed with his family. His wife, Kayla, pushed him to finish his degree while she completed hers in business administration, UMGC Europe\u2019s most popular major this year. As they prepared to walk the stage Saturday, they described how they hit the books after putting their kids to bed. \u201cWe\u2019re up until midnight or 1 o\u2019clock, writing codes or writing papers,\u201d Kerly LaBranche said.

Family also motivated Air Force Tech. Sgt. Vanessa Alonzo, 30, to earn her degree in criminal justice after years of schooling, pursued in fits and starts between deployments, short tours and moves, she said. Alonzo, who works in cyberdefense operations at Ramstein, grew up in Los Angeles, with a father who went to prison for gang activity when she was 11. Her degree helped her learn more about gangs and understand what may have drawn her father to that life. \u201cWhile it wasn\u2019t the best avenue (for him) to go through, it helped me understand why he was there and how I can help others to not follow that path,\u201d she said. \u201cI woke up this morning and was telling my husband, \u2018I can\u2019t believe I\u2019m actually graduating,\u2019\u201d Alonzo said. \u201cIt\u2019s been 12 years. I\u2019m finally there.\u201d
<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Story by Jennifer H. Svan RAMSTEIN AIR BASE, Germany \u2013 When Jennifer Egbe deployed to Poland in January, she was 18 credits shy of earning her bachelor\u2019s degree. The Army National Guard supply specialist and communications major enrolled in the University of Maryland Global Campus Europe. From her barracks at Powidz Air Base, a key  Read the Rest…<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":160,"featured_media":9616,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-9611","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/ng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9611","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/ng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/ng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/ng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/160"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/ng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9611"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/ng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9611\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9617,"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/ng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9611\/revisions\/9617"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/ng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/9616"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/ng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9611"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/ng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9611"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/ng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9611"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}