Approximately 1,500 students are expected to participate in UNLV commencement ceremonies on May 14.

UNLV Registrar Jeff Halverson estimated that more than 2,400 students will be eligible to participate.

For the fourth consecutive year, UNLV will have two separate spring commencement ceremonies. The afternoon ceremony will begin at 1 p.m. Participating in that ceremony will be the graduates of the College of Extended Studies, College of Fine Arts, William F. Harrah College of Hotel Administration, College of Liberal Arts, College of Sciences, and Greenspun College of Urban Affairs.

Students receiving degrees from the College of Business, College of Education, Howard R. Hughes College of Engineering, and the College of Health Sciences will participate in the evening ceremony, which will begin at 5 p.m.

Both ceremonies will take place in the Thomas & Mack Center. No tickets are required.

During the ceremonies, President's Medals will be presented to state Sen. Bill Raggio, the majority leader of Nevada's Senate; gaming executive Donald D. Snyder, president and board member of Boyd Gaming; and state Sen. Dina Titus, the minority leader of Nevada's Senate who also is a UNLV political science professor.

Communications counselor and government affairs specialist Billy Vassiliadis, president of R&R Partners, and 101-year-old great-grandmother Alice Turner, who has devoted much of her life to volunteerism, including work with abused and neglected children and AIDS patients, will be honored as Distinguished Nevadans.

Nobel Prize-winning playwright Wole Soyinka will be awarded an honorary doctor of humane letters degree. A native of Nigeria, Soyinka, who also is a poet, novelist, essayist, and theater director, won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1986.

UNLV music professor Virko Baley will be honored for his selection as a UNLV distinguished professor. Distinguished professorships are awarded periodically to faculty members who have excelled nationally and internationally in teaching, research, and service. Baley's title now will be distinguished professor of music.

A hotline message containing additional details about commencement may be reached by calling 895-3229.