American International College to Honor Board Treasurer and Alumnae at Commencement

Springfield, MA, May 14, 2013 --(PR.com)-- Attorney A. Craig Brown of Longmeadow and educator Mary Raissi Stewart of Enfield, Conn., will receive honorary degrees at the American International College commencement ceremony.

Some 300 undergraduate and 790 graduate degrees will be awarded to students representing 11 foreign countries and 19 U.S. states. Among the graduates will be 75-year old Ronald Lindman, who will be receiving his bachelor's degree in English; sister and brother Erin and Brian Edwards, both EDD students; sisters, Bonnie (BA) and Sarah Boornazian (DPT), and husband and wife Natalie (EDD) and William (MED) Metzger.

AIC students won't be the only students in attendance at the event. A group of 8th graders from the Kennedy Middle School in Springfield will be on hand to watch the proceedings. Corrine Cheffer, a special education teacher at Kennedy, said the students wanted to experience the

college atmosphere. "We would like to follow it up with a field trip to AIC campus. We would like the students to know what Springfield has to offer," she said.

Brown will be the keynote speaker at the AIC Commencement. He is a member of the Springfield law firm of Doherty, Wallace, Pillsbury and Murphy, P.C., and treasurer of the AIC board of trustees.

A graduate of Dartmouth College, Brown also received a master's degree from Georgetown University. He serves on several area boards including the Springfield School Volunteers, Regional Employment Board of Hampden County and the Urban League of Springfield.

Brown served as a high school and college lacrosse official for many years and is the founder and past president of both the Western Mass. Lacrosse, Inc., and the Connecticut Valley Youth Lacrosse, Inc.

After receiving her bachelor's degree from AIC in 1942, Stewart began her teaching career, a career that spanned five decades. Stewart returned to AIC in 1949, after receiving her master's degree from UConn, and worked in the Alumni Office coordinating events and setting up files for each of the previous classes at the college beginning with 1885, the year AIC was founded.

Although she still lives in St. Croix for most of the year, during the summer, Stewart lives in Middletown, Conn. She has been active locally speaking at the Calvary Presbyterian Church in Enfield about her experiences in St. Croix.

Stewart worked for law offices off and on during her career, but primarily she taught secretarial and management courses at Moody Secretarial School, Holyoke Community College, and the University of Vermont. She also as served as a Chief yeoman in the U.S. Coast Guard in the early 40s where she taught business courses.