LIFTED Commencement

University of California, Irvine’s LIFTED program celebrated our second commencement on June 18, 2025. In all, sixteen students earned bachelor’s degrees in Sociology. For the first time this year, eleven students also earned a minor in English. Following in the footsteps of the first cohort, these students won many academic honors, including three who graduated summa cum laude and four who graduated magna cum laude.

At a time when community feels thin and frayed across the world, our LIFTED students and everyone—across multiple state institutions—who supports this program, remind us again and again of the transformative power of (re)building community together.