(Worcester, Mass.) -- Worcester State University will welcome Dr. Imo Aisiku '92 as its 136th Commencement speaker, Saturday, May 12 at the DCU Center in Worcester.
There will be 891 undergraduate students expected to receive bachelor of arts and bachelor of science degrees and 215 students expected to receive graduate degrees.
Dr. Aisiku serves as vice-chair and chief of critical care in the neurosurgery department of the University of Texas Medical School at Memorial-Hermann Hospital in Houston, Texas. He is part of the team that provided care for U.S. Rep. Gabrielle Giffords.
After earning a bachelor's degree in biology from WSU, he earned a medical degree from the UMass School of Medicine, a master’s degree in clinical research from Emory University’s Rollins School of Public Health and an MBA from Emory’s Goizueta School of Business. He completed his residency in Emergency Medicine and completed fellowships in Critical Care and Neurocritical Care and was recognized by the National Institutes of Health as a sickle cell research scholar in 2008. When he was accepted into UMass Medical School, Aisiku was concerned that coming from a small state college might be a disadvantage. “Many of my classmates were from places like Harvard and Boston College,” he explains. “I soon realized that I was very well prepared for the medical program.”
Last April, Dr. Aisiku visited the WSU campus for the lecture "Developments in Medicine and Neuroscience: A Physician's Perspective," He also presented two research awards that he established for Worcester State biology majors during last year's Academic Achievement awards.
Aisiku, whose father is a professor emeritus in WSU’s Education Department and whose mother was a special education teacher at Burncoat Middle School, moved with his family to Auburn, Massachusetts from Brooklyn, New York when he was in high school.
Worcester State University will award an honorary doctoral degree to Dr. Aisiku as part of the commencement ceremony. The University will also present Urban Studies Professor Steven H. Corey, Ph.D., and Chair of the Dr. Lillian R. Goodman Department of Nursing Stephanie Chalupka, Ed.D., with the 2012 George I. Alden Excellence in Teaching Awards.
For more information on commencement, visit: http://www.worcester.edu/commencement.
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