With powerful words, Graduate Student Speaker Shelley Joshi reminded us: ‘We’re Not Who We Were.’ A celebration of growth, resilience, and the future unfolding. Congratulations to the Class of 2025 — your journey is just beginning.

Not just signing off—signing on to the next chapter.

Worcester Polytechnic Institute (WPI) celebrated its 2025 Commencement with a series of ceremonies honoring the achievements of graduates across all degree levels. For the second year, commencement exercises were held at the DCU Center, where WPI conferred 1,298 bachelor’s degrees, 867 master’s degrees, and 87 doctoral degrees to members of the Class of 2025, representing a diverse range of disciplines in science, engineering, technology, business, and the humanities. Undergraduate Commencement President Grace J. Wang, PhD, and Board of Trustees Chair William Fitzgerald presided over the 156th Commencement exercises on Friday, May 16. Wang told members of the Class of 2025 they are entering a changing world filled with competing visions for how to solve challenges and advance society. But, she said, along with knowledge and technical competence in their chosen fields of study, WPI graduates have been equipped with the ability to think critically, to be resilient, to work in teams, and to do it all with a sense of ethics and global responsibility. “Outside these walls today is a world that needs you,” Wang said. “Not just because of what you have learned to do in your chosen field, but because of who you are, and also because of the leadership qualities you built at WPI.” Delivering the undergraduate Commencement address, Michelle Gass ’90, president and chief executive officer of Levi Strauss & Co., reflected on her journey from student to global business leader to inspire the Class of 2025. Gass said she’s often asked how a chemical engineering graduate from WPI became CEO of one of the most iconic apparel companies in the world. The answer, she told the graduates, lies in a handful of guiding principles she started refining in her years on the WPI campus.“I’ve realized that to the extent I’ve been successful and able to engineer the kind of life I wanted for myself and my family, it’s largely because I learned how to approach problems and moments intentionally and productively, while keeping real people in mind at all times,” Gass said. Gass and Mark Fuller, chair and treasurer of the George F. and Sybil H. Fuller Foundation, a significant supporter of WPI, received honorary degrees as part of the ceremony.Student speaker Dhespina Zhidro, a biomedical engineering and mechanical engineering double major, reminded fellow graduates about the community they formed for themselves, shaped by a collective experience that included struggle, doubt, and, ultimately, achievement. “WPI has given us more than an education,” Zhidro said. “It has given us a blueprint for how to live, how to lead, create meaningful change, and leave every place we enter better than we found it.” Graduate Commencement During the graduate students’ ceremony on Thursday, May 15, Wang urged graduates to embrace true leadership and push boundaries, values that have been part of WPI since its founding in 1865—the same year Abraham Lincoln gave his second inaugural address. “You share a spirit that has been with us since the very beginning of our university,” Wang said. “Believe in the power of discovery. Be creative. Explore.” Graduate ceremony speaker Noubar Afeyan—inventor, entrepreneur, and founder of Flagship Pioneering, and co-founder and chair of Moderna, the pioneering messenger RNA biotech company—encouraged graduates to make room for artificial intelligence in their research and their careers, and to use it. The advent of AI has brought together machine, human, and natural intelligence into what he called “polyintelligence,” a combination that will open the door to an entire new world of scientific discoveries, he said, adding that humans will not be sidelined. “This new era will need each and every one of you,” Afeyan said. “It will need data scientists, robotics engineers, biologists, physicists, civil engineers, entrepreneurs.” Afeyan and Francesca Maltese, who served 15 years on the Board of Trustees and led the board’s facilities committee during the planning, design, development, and construction of several buildings at WPI, received honorary degrees at the event. Student speaker Shelley Joshi, who earned a master’s degree in information technology, said some of her fellow graduates came to WPI from one town over. Others crossed oceans to get here. But they’re all leaving with a shared experience of camaraderie and growth they’ll take with them as their careers develop. “We learned that leadership doesn’t always mean leading the charge, sometimes it just means showing up with a snack, or with a smile, or just with presence,” Joshi said.ROTC CommissioningWPI’s 2025 Commencement Week also included a Commissioning Ceremony at Alden Memorial for the Higher Education Consortium of Central Massachusetts’ Reserve Officers’ Training Corps (ROTC). On Wednesday, May 14, 20 cadets in the Army and Air Force programs at Brown University, the College of the Holy Cross, the University of Massachusetts Lowell, WPI, an...

That’s a wrap. Grad commencement: complete. Time to sign off. 🖊️

Today we unlock a new core memory 🥹

For Fatimah Daffaie ’25, the path to studying at Worcester Polytechnic Institute involved early years living in Iraq, exposure to engineering while in high school in Worcester, and a pre-collegiate experience on the WPI campus.  In this episode of The WPI Podcast, Daffaie shares her experience as a biomedical engineering student, including how she completed both her bachelor’s and master’s degrees in just four years through the BS/MS program, an accelerated degree pathway.  She talks about the support she received as a recipient of a Great Minds CoMPASS Scholarship, which is available to eligible first-generation students from Worcester Public Schools who attend WPI. She also discusses the lessons she learned through serving as a member of Crimson Key, a group of student tour guides who assist prospective students and families during campus visits, and in the Engineering Ambassadors program, which allows college students to share their passion for STEM and inspire future engineers by engaging with K–12 students.  You may also read the transcript below. 

As we approach the end of Teacher Appreciation Week, we’re sharing our final 'Guess the Professor'—a fun way to celebrate the incredible educators who inspire us every day. Take a guess and join us in thanking our amazing faculty!

What are some of the most Googled questions about WPI? Glad you asked. We have the answers... 🐐