This year’s spring Commencement will award approximately 3,352 degrees to Binghamton University bachelor’s, master’s and doctoral candidates, four of whom were selected to speak at the ceremonies.

Ceremonies will take place on Saturday and Sunday in the Events Center. Binghamton University will also recognize its 100,000th graduate at this time.

The selected students applied for the speaker positions by submitting recommendations and their speeches to a committee consisting of admissions faculty and commencement coordinators.

Tobey Lass will speak at the ceremony for the professional schools on Sunday. She will receive her Bachelor of Science degree in human development, with a minor in Judaic studies.

After graduation, Lass will attend Columbia University’s Teacher’s College for a master’s degree in early intervention special education with a concentration in intellectual disability and autism.

‘I want my final message to be that the graduating class is actually a pretty kick-ass group of people who will make a difference,’ Lass said.

Brigitta Berze, a graduating senior who will receive her bachelor’s degree in environmental studies, will speak at the Harpur College ceremony Sunday morning.

Following graduation, she will intern with a New York-based nonprofit environmental organization before attending CUNY City College for graduate school in the fall.

‘I plan on talking about some experiences I had at the school as a transfer, talking about the environment ‘ and just try to get a few laughs,’ Berze said.

Adam Amit, who will receive a bachelor’s degree in philosophy, politics and law, will speak at Harpur College’s Sunday afternoon ceremony.

Upon graduation, Amit, current Student Association president, will travel and volunteer in Africa and Israel for a year. His ultimate goal is to work in the public sector in the nation’s capital.

‘Everyone calls life after college the real world and in my speech I’m talking about how if that’s the real world, then the past four years were basically the dream world,’ he said.

Daniel O’Brien, a doctoral candidate in biological sciences, came to BU to work with David Sloan Wilson on the evolution of cooperative behavior.

He will begin postdoctoral study at the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study at Harvard University following Commencement. Specifically, he ‘will be involved in the construction of a whole city research infrastructure in Boston, Mass., similar to the one [he] helped create here with the Binghamton Neighborhood Project,’ he said.

O’Brien will speak at the graduate school ceremony on Saturday. He said he will discuss the process of completing education and how students ‘begin to embody [their] field ‘ be it nursing, chemistry or education,’ he said.

BU will also award honorary doctorates to two candidates: Steven H. Bloom, hedge fund investor and entrepreneur, and Ahmet Acar, rector of Middle East Technical University in Ankara, Turkey. Acar was chosen for his role in designing a dual-degree program between Turkish universities and BU. Bloom, a BU alumnus of the class of 1978 was chosen for his sustained ties to the school. Both candidates had to be approved by the SUNY board of trustees.

Both recipients will be awarded an honorary Doctor of Humane Letters degree. Acar is scheduled to speak at the Harpur afternoon ceremony, and Bloom will speak at the Harpur College of Arts and Sciences morning ceremony.