In a little more than a week, members of the class of 2003 will have the opportunity to come together on the Lawn for the third-annual ring ceremony, an event at which students receive their class rings. This year, the third-year class also will be the first to participate in a ring dance held at the Alumni Ballroom of Alumni Hall.
Third Year Class Vice President Kelli Preston said she thinks the ring ceremony and dance will be particularly special for students like her who never purchased a high school ring.
The idea to sponsor a dance stemmed from discussions among those on the ring ceremony planning committee about ring dances being held at other universities such as the Naval Academy and Virginia Military Institute, Preston said.
The ring dance is "one more experience that you'll be able to treasure for years," she said.
At many other schools ring dances are formal but the University's ring dance will be semi-formal in the hopes that this will encourage more students to attend the new event.
"Hopefully in years to come it will grow to be on a grander scale," Preston said.
According to Preston, the ceremony will have "the feel of the Intermediate Honors induction," a ceremony in which third-year students with a grade point average above 3.4 participate. Both ceremonies honoring third-year students will use the same set-up on the south side of the Lawn, and both will involve a similar procession accompanied by students' names being called.
The ceremony will take place Oct. 26 at 4:30 p.m. on the Lawn, or in University Hall in case of inclement weather. The dance will be held Oct. 27 from 9 p.m. until midnight in Alumni Hall.
About 850 students have signed up to participate in the ceremony.
"Any ceremony that promotes cohesion within a class is good," said James Sofka, a government and foreign affairs professor, who is the keynote speaker at the ring dance ceremony.
Ring dance committee members chose Sofka after compiling a list of professors who they believe have impacted University students' lives and who also were popular among the student body. Sofka's name appeared several times on the list among the committee members' nominations.
"I'm very flattered they asked me," Sofka said. The planning committee notified Sofka of his selection in July.
Now, he said his thoughts about his speech are centered around melding the importance of a liberal arts education with current world events, especially international terrorism.
Plans for the ring dance and ceremony have been underway since the beginning of this semester.
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