Salesforce Exec, a UMass Lowell Alum, Tapped As Keynote Speaker
Image by Bill McCormack
UMass Lowell will welcome more than 3,000 first-year and transfer students at Convocation this year.
08/29/2024
WHAT: Convocation will welcome UMass Lowell first-year and transfer students to campus, introducing them to university initiatives designed to promote academic achievement and connect them to career opportunities.
The event’s keynote speaker Vala Afshar – Salesforce’s chief digital evangelist and a UMass Lowell graduate – personifies such success. Twice named the top social media influencer of chief marketing officers by Forbes, Afshar will reminisce about his time at the university and share life lessons that shaped his professional path with incoming students.
A business and innovation influencer and bestselling author, Afshar is a U.S. patent holder, podcaster and columnist who has more than 1 million followers on social media. He grew up in Burlington, Massachusetts, and earned his bachelor’s and master’s degrees in electrical engineering from the university in 1994 and 1996.
UMass Lowell Chancellor Julie Chen will also address students, sharing news about the university’s Lowell Innovation Network Corridor, a public-private partnership that will transform the Mill City in the next decade. Bringing new businesses, jobs and housing, the initiative will provide another avenue for UMass Lowell students to pursue career-connected opportunities for pay or course credit while enrolled, a university priority Chen announced last year. The focus on applied, real-world experience is even more meaningful as UMass Lowell elevates to become a Research 1 institution this year, a top-tier designation that acknowledges and grows the university’s research footprint and funding for larger impact.
Event speakers will include Student Government Association President Casey McCauley, a criminal justice major from Melrose, Massachusetts; pharmaceutical sciences major Daia Hansford of Bowie, Maryland, co-president of the women’s lacrosse team who serves on UMass Lowell’s Student Athlete Advisory Council; and Stephanie Nicum, a public health major from Derry, New Hampshire. Nicum is the UMass Lowell student trustee on the UMass Board of Trustees, which oversees the five-campus system. Members of the UMass Lowell Air Force ROTC Detachment 345 will present the colors and the UMass Lowell Marching Band will perform.
More than 3,000 new students have enrolled at UMass Lowell this fall. An estimated 450 of them have elected to join the university’s River Hawk Scholars Academy, a nationally acclaimed academic and support services program for individuals who are the first in their families to attend college. And, approximately 800 incoming students will join the university’s Honors College, bringing its membership to an estimated 1,900.
WHEN and WHERE: Tuesday, Sept. 3, 10:45 a.m., Tsongas Center at UMass Lowell, 300 Martin Luther King Jr. Way, Lowell
Media members interested in covering this event should contact UMass Lowell media relations for directions and parking information.
Contacts for media: Emily Gowdey-Backus, Emily_GowdeyBackus@uml.edu and Nancy Cicco, Nancy_Cicco@uml.edu