Celebrating a Master’s Degree from Arizona State University

Nearly two years and ten courses into it, I am finally a Master’s graduate from Arizona State University’s Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication.

Was the Digital Audience Strategy (DAS) program worth it? Yes, but I’ll detail that in a blog or blogs down the road. There is so much to get into.

For this entry, we traveled to Phoenix, Arizona — Scottsdale to be specific with an eye on Tempe for Convocation ’24. The big day was May 10, 2024, and in the pantheon of big days for me, it was one of the biggest and the best.

My wife and stepdaughter accompanied me to Scottsdale, Arizona, where we stayed at Great Wolf Lodge. We had stayed at GWLs before, one in Colorado Springs and one in Grapevine, Texas, both of which were superior to the location in Scottsdale. However, not to diminish it, Great Wolf Lodge is always a good time if you don’t mind kiddos.

The Lodge does have beer, and I was quite enamored of a variety called “Scottsdale Blonde.” I was also impressed that the little restaurant inside Great Wolf Lodge had hockey playoffs on the TV. For any of you who didn’t know, Phoenix lost its NHL team to Utah this spring. More about that in a future blog post.

I didn’t take pics because there were a ton of other people who would have been in the shot, but later in the weekend, we spent an afternoon in one of Great Wolf Lodge’s swimming area cabanas — and it was amazing. I pounded some post-graduation beers and watched the Oklahoma City Thunder lose to the Dallas Mavericks. (Boo!)

In between our arrival and the weekend, we did a bit of sightseeing in Tempe. First, I needed to drop off a FAFSA check that I didn’t intend to use so that I wouldn’t get charged for it. That meant a trip to a bursar’s office for the first time since at least 1992 when I was a senior at the University of Oklahoma. There was no line, and in fact, because it was ‘Dead Week’ on campus, I had to sneak into the building on ASU’s campus. I followed a maintenance worker right in the locked front door.

If you’ve never been to Tempe, it’s like an oasis in the Greater Phoenix Area or ‘The Valley’ as its called. Tempe Town Lake runs through it, and it’s rather beautiful. The campus itself has a definite summer-all-the-time vibe.

We stopped by a Sun Devils fan shop so I could stock up on merch. Right after, we hit up Phoenix Premium Outlets! If you want to see what all I ended up buying, check out the video at the top of this post.

We worked up an appetite after the trip to the outlet mall, which was mostly devoid of people surprisingly. Maybe it’s the result of inflation or perhaps it’s always been this way, but there weren’t many bargains to be found there either. I had been there a few years back, and I seemed to remember that the Ralph Lauren and Lacoste stores had some great deals. Not so much this time.

Attacked by hunger, we landed upon a place in Tempe called Bonfire Craft Kitchen and Tap House, which had been featured on the hit show “Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives.” The service was super friendly, and it was hopping on a late Thursday afternoon. I ordered the chicken nachos, and I should have known that was a mistake. A place in Norman, Okla., called Pepe Delgados has the best chicken nachos on the planet, and it isn’t close. My wife had a pasta dish, and she washed it down with a cucumber margarita rimmed with tajin.

Just kidding. That was me.

At night, we chilled out as the Great Wolf Lodge water park closed each night at 8. One evening, we decided to watch a movie, and so my wife and I introduced the kiddo to the rom-com classic “You’ve Got Mail.” We’re going through a rom-com phase with her. Love that movie.

Friday was convocation morning. I did not attend the broader ASU graduation at Mountain America Stadium. The convocation was for the Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication and was held in Desert Financial Arena, home of Sun Devils basketball greats Lu Dort and James Harden, one a current star with the Oklahoma City Thunder and the other a former one.

Graduates staged at the football stadium and were carted to the basketball arena. I was immediately mistaken for a professor, which I didn’t mind. This staging, however, gave me a chance to get a peek at the Sun Devil football field. I’d love to go to an Arizona State home game some time if they ever play a game in less than 200-degree heat.

I truly wish I would have taken more pictures and video from the trip. Just being there for the convocation was my reward for two years of hard work. It was so gratifying. Our keynote speaker was the president of CBS News, Ingrid Ciprián-Matthews. She was great, but I don’t recall what she said nearly as much as I did the speech of retiring professor Dr. Joe Russomanno. He was not one of the professors who taught me as part of the DAS program, but his address was inspiring, centered on journalists taking their rightful spot as truth-tellers in society.

Despite my gray hair, I felt the fountain of youth outside the arena after convocation.

In a life filled with lots of big moments the past several years, this was near the top of the list. When I look back on the ‘whole of the moon,’ to quote an 80s song, I can’t think of many better days I’ve had.

Not No. 1, but Top 10 for sure.