December Commencement 2024: ODUGlobal By the Numbers
By Jonathan Heeter | Dec 10, 2024
Aubree Brown discovered her career path in 10th grade.
Brown ’24 tutored an autistic student and found a calling to teach students with special needs.
In a short time, Brown started substitute teaching at Honaker Elementary School and doubled up on her course load at community college and then as a student at Old Dominion University. Through hard work and dedication, Brown, scheduled to graduate from ODU this semester at 20 years old, will become the university’s youngest online graduate this term.
“I’m very proud because I’ve pushed myself hard to finish my degree quickly,” said Brown, a first-generation college student.
Working at the same elementary school in southwestern Virginia she attended and alongside her former teachers, Brown said she already feels the rewarding impact of giving back to her community.
“Everybody knows everybody here,” Brown said of Honaker, a town of 1,217 not far from the borders of Kentucky, Tennessee and West Virginia. “It’s fulfilling to know the families of your students, and they know you, so you build a strong connection. It’s a tight-knit community.”
Brown took asynchronous classes in the evening while working, and she pointed to that flexibility as the chief reason for graduating at 20. She said she’s likely to return to ODU in the future for her master’s degree, but her immediate plans include celebrating commencement on a family trip to Pigeon Forge, Tennessee.
Brown is one of 738 online students to graduate through ODUGlobal in Fall 2024. The commencement class represents more than 40 percent of ODU’s 1,748 total Fall Commencement 2024 class, which includes students from 39 states and 33 countries.
As ODU celebrates its latest class of graduates through ODUGlobal, here’s an overall look at the graduating class of online students for Fall 2024 by the numbers.
3.43 – Average GPA for graduates
6 – Nations represented among graduates
32 – States represented in Fall Commencement
15 – PhD candidates in this graduating class
19.4 – The percent increase of the graduating class from Fall 2023 to 2024
32.5 – Average age of graduate this semester
42.22 – Percentage of the overall graduating class who are online students
55 – Graduates with bachelor’s degrees in psychology, the most popular major among undergraduates
56 – Library and information studies master’s degree graduates, the most popular program among graduate students
76 – The total number of cybersecurity graduates between undergraduate and graduate programs
197 – Online graduates from the College of Education, the largest group of any of ODU’s colleges
233 – Military-affiliated graduates
57 – Active-duty military members
476 – Total number of undergraduate students
20 – Age of the youngest graduate
72 – Age of the oldest graduate