Jamie Katz to deliver student commencement speech

ANN ARBOR—Jamie Katz, a 1996 graduate of Adams High School in South Bend, Ind., has been chosen to be the student speaker at the University of Michigan commencement on April 29.

Katz will receive her degree in English with a subconcentration in creative writing. At U-M, she has received class honors, was inducted into the Golden Key Honors Society and won a Hopwood Award for fiction in 1997. In the summer of 1998, she participated in the U-M New England Literature Program, and the summer before that was a member of the Hermelin Archaeological Dig through Hebrew University.

In her speech, Katz says she will share “one of the many qualities about Michigan that has been especially important to me, that is, this campus provides an extraordinary environment for change and growth on a daily basis in a myriad of ways.”

A committee of faculty, staff and students selected Katz from 19 applicants. She had to submit a written version of the speech and provide a verbal presentation on an audio cassette.

During her four years at U-M, Katz has been an on-call team member for Project Safehouse, an organization that offers intervention for survivors of domestic violence. She has also been a peer educator and facilitated workshops on domestic violence and sexual assault for the Sexual Assault Prevention and Awareness Center, served on the planning committee for Hillel‘s Conference on the Holocaust, and worked as an administrative assistant at the Michigan Union.

Katz was salutatorian of her class at Adams, where she was president of the student government for two years, editor-in-chief of the school’s literary arts magazine, and a reporter on the student newspaper.

She chose to attend U-M, she says, both for its academic reputation and its “Big Ten/Big Time college experience—large student body, large campus, sports.” After graduation, Katz plans to write and be involved in community service.

She is the daughter of Laurie and Steven Katz of Granger, Ind.

EnglishSexual Assault Prevention and Awareness Center