San José City College held its 103rd annual commencement ceremony on Thursday afternoon on the campus at 2100 Moorpark Avenue, as hundreds of family members, faculty, and administrators gathered to celebrate the graduating Class of 2026.
More than 450 students crossed the stage during the ceremony, representing a class of 621 students who completed 1,051 associate degrees and 643 students who completed 753 certificates of achievement. The graduates ranged in age from 13 to 78 years old.
Photo by Lilith Sanchez
“Today marks the 103rd San José City College Commencement — the largest and most joyful celebration on this campus — and it belongs entirely to you, the Class of 2026,” said SJCC President Dr. Marilyn Flores. “You are our why. You are the reason this college exists, and we are deeply honored to witness what you have built.”
Flores, the first Latina president in SJCC’s history, drew directly on her own biography to address graduates. She described growing up as a second-language learner raised by a single mother who worked in a fish factory and received only a third-grade education. The first in her family to pursue higher education, Flores said she navigated college without a map or mentor, earning her bachelor’s, master’s, and doctoral degrees on her own.
“Wherever you came from, you belong here,” Flores told graduates. “And wherever you are going, you are more than ready.”
San José–Evergreen Community College District Chancellor Dr. Beatriz Chaidez echoed the theme of perseverance in her remarks.
“Every person crossing this stage tonight has a story,” Chaidez said. “For many of you, this journey was not easy. There were sacrifices, long nights, moments of doubt, and times when continuing may have felt impossible, but you kept going. That perseverance is what makes this achievement so meaningful.”
Photos by Lilith Sanchez
Board of Trustees President Dr. Jeffrey Lease offered graduates a message passed down from his father, a San José State University professor: “In life, son, there are many things you will earn, and some of them, like a car or a house, can be taken away from you, but no one can EVER take away your education.”
ASG President Nguyen Minh Ha (Hazel) Tran, speaking on behalf of the student body, described arriving at SJCC as a seed planted in unfamiliar soil, uncertain of her major and her path. She said the relationships she built with student parents juggling coursework and children, with veterans rebuilding their lives, with international students learning in a second language, ultimately defined her experience.
“Being scared does not mean you are not capable,” Tran told her classmates. “Sometimes, it just means you are growing.”
Tran closed with a message to her family watching from Vietnam, delivering a greeting in Vietnamese before urging the class to carry three principles forward: be original, be proud, and be who you are meant to be.
Ganna Zgama, named the 2026 valedictorian, delivered what may have been the ceremony’s most striking personal narrative. Born in Crimea, Ukraine, Zgama said she had already experienced immigration twice — in 2014 and again in 2022, both due to the war in Ukraine, and that both years were supposed to have been graduation years.
“So standing here today is not just an achievement,” she said. “It is the first time I am finishing something in the way it was meant to be finished.”
Zgama, who graduated with four associate degrees — including in communications and graphic design — a 4.0 GPA, and admission to UC Berkeley and the University of Southern California, said the most important lesson she learned at SJCC was not academic.
“I learned how to choose myself,” she said. “I hope we don’t just leave here with degrees. I hope we leave here with permission to be original, to be proud, and to keep becoming who we already are underneath everything we’ve been told to be.”
Academic Senate President Mark Branom closed out the speaker program with a brief but well-received send-off.
“And now, for the last time at City College, I hereby announce: class is dismissed!”
The ceremony concluded with the tassel-turning tradition, led by Flores alongside Tran and Zgama, before graduates were officially conferred their degrees and certificates.
“You are now officially graduates and alumni of San José City College,” Flores told the class. “Congratulations to our Jaguar Class of 2026.”
