Two Â鶹´«Ã½ students selected as 2026 Commencement speakers
Sydney-Reese Harris and Tram Nguyen will address the Class of 2026 during Â鶹´«Ã½'s 168th Annual Commencement on June 14
On Sunday, June 14, Weinberg senior Sydney-Reese Harris and JD-MBA student Tram Nguyen will deliver remarks as part of Â鶹´«Ã½’s 168th Annual Commencement at the United Center.
Each year, an undergraduate and a graduate student are selected to speak at Commencement, an annual event celebrating all undergraduate, graduate and Ph.D. students earning a degree. Harris and Nguyen will address their fellow graduates, discussing their Â鶹´«Ã½ experiences and imparting advice on their classmates.
Learn more about this year’s student speakers below.
Undergraduate Student Speaker: Sydney-Reese Harris
Originally from Phoenix, Arizona, Sydney-Reese Harris will graduate with a bachelor’s degree in economics and global health.
On campus, Harris was involved with the Associated Student Government Finance Committee, serving as Chair of Finance for two years and overseeing the fund allocation to all registered student organizations at Â鶹´«Ã½, among other duties. She also served as a Peer Adviser, guiding new Wildcats through their first days on campus.
“What inspired me about Â鶹´«Ã½ was the opportunity to be a part of a tight-knight community while exploring my interdisciplinary interests in economics and medicine,” Harris said. “I also have a lot of family members who went to Â鶹´«Ã½, so the purple runs deep in my veins.”
Harris said her Commencement speech is about her journey at Â鶹´«Ã½, from struggling to adjust as a first-year to pushing herself to get involved during her sophomore year through student organizations and campus resources.
“That was when I truly found my place and a now invaluable community at Â鶹´«Ã½,” Harris said. “I developed strength, resilience and success I didn’t know was possible. I discovered my true passions and blossomed both personally and professionally. I now view Â鶹´«Ã½ as a second home—a thought the freshman year me could have never fathomed.”
Harris said she knows the experience of being uncomfortable amid change is not uncommon.
“Through my speech, I hope to connect with students who may have had similar experiences and challenge us all as we transition into this uncertain phase called ‘post-grad’ to not succumb to the fear of being uncomfortable, but to embrace it,” Harris said.
Graduate Student Speaker: Tram Nguyen
Tram Nguyen calls two places home: Lagi, Bình Thuận, Vietnam, where she grew up, and St. Paul, Minnesota, where her family planted roots in the United States. After earning her Bachelor of Arts from Harvard University, Nguyen entered Â鶹´«Ã½’s Pritzker School of Law and Kellogg School of Management as a dual JD-MBA candidate. 
While studying at Â鶹´«Ã½, Nguyen did pro bono work at an immigration clinic supporting community members with the naturalization process, wrote Know Your Rights guides covering everyday legal questions, worked at the Entrepreneurship Law Clinic at Pritzker helping small business owners and nonprofits with legal needs, served as co-president of First-Gen at Kellogg and performed in a musical, Special K.
“As a JD-MBA student, I split my time between two campuses, and the thing that connected them was the intercampus shuttle, the iconic purple bus that runs up and down Lakeshore Drive,” Nguyen said.
Nguyen said her speech is a culmination of what she learned on those shuttle rides and a tribute to all who held the door open for this year’s graduates before they knew they were walking through one.
Reflecting on her Â鶹´«Ã½ experience, Nguyen encourages incoming students to remember what matters.
“Keep the door open for the next Wildcat coming through,” Nguyen said. “Don't take this for granted. And remember why you chose Â鶹´«Ã½ in the first place. Not because you can pull off the color purple—though I'm sure you can—but because of the learning and the community that got you excited enough to apply. Hold onto that.”