Raja to speak at university commencement
WAYNESBURG – Graduation caps will be soaring May 1 for Waynesburg University’s annual commencement ceremony when 520 undergraduate, graduate and doctoral students will be honored.
The commencement processional begins at 1:40 p.m. and the ceremony follows at 2 p.m. on the front lawn of Miller Hall or, in case of inclement weather, in Rudy Marisa Fieldhouse.
The college announced Wednesday that D. Raja, owner of Computer Enterprises Inc., a computer software company in Pittsburgh, will be the commencement speaker this year.
Raja, a former Mt. Lebanon commissioner and president of TiE Pittsburgh’s Business Mentoring Roundtable, is the founding chair of University of Pittsburgh’s Computer Science Industry Board. He’s won multiple awards as an entrepreneur for his business from 2007 to 2009, and he hosts a business and finance radio program called “The Raja Show” on KDKA.
Raja has a master’s degree in computer science from University of Pittsburgh and a master’s in business administration from Carnegie Mellon University. He also holds a bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering from Anna University in India.
Waynesburg will also hold a Baccalaureate service in Roberts Chapel at 11 a.m. when the Rev. Richard Edgar Visser, a longtime pastor of First Baptist Church in Waynesburg who retired in 2003.
Visser and his wife, the Rev. Carol Edwards Visser, won numerous awards for their community service and missions’ outreach in several churches throughout Pennsylvania and Maine. Visser also served on the board for WHS-Greene hospital, Greene County Department of Human Services, American Red Cross and Community Foundation of Greene County.
He completed two degrees at Gordon College, along with two master’s degrees at Gordon Divinity School and a doctor of ministry at Asbury Theological Seminary.
During the commencement ceremony, both Raja and Visser will receive honorary degrees, Doctors of Humane Letters, for the ways in which their lives and personal missions relate to the mission of Waynesburg University.