Faculty and Academic Regalia

When people graduate from high school in the United States they wear academic regalia like graduation hoods, and graduation robes. There are other people who wear these items also. The people that work at schools and educational facilities are known as faculty. Faculty that works at educational facilities like Universities and colleges are required by their campus rules to wear their academic dress at least two times a year. Colleges and Universities have commencement or graduating ceremonies in the spring of the year and again in the fall of the year. Faculty is expected to attend these services wearing their academicals. 

You will notice when you watch a high school class walk across the stage to get their diplomas that they all have the same gowns on and the same hats on. They match completely because each of these students is on equal footing with the other students. No one is ranked as having more education than the other. There is a valedictorian that is considered to be the student of that graduating class that had the best performance and scores throughout their high school career but even the valedictorian is dressed like all of the other children are dressed.

In college commencement services you first notice the differences in the robes and the caps they are wearing when the procession of teachers, professors, and faculty come through to take their seats. You notice that not all of them have on robes of the same color, and the hats are not all alike. Some of the faculty will have on hoods and some of them are wearing colored cords. Some of them have outfits on that have one color on the robe and then two colors on the hood draped around their neck and then a third color is piped on that hood as well.

When the students begin to file in to take their seats you will once again be taken aback by the fact that they are not all wearing the same colors. At first it appears as if they all went to different schools or something. Then you begin to notice the differences and what they mean. Every color and everything that is on this attire has a significant meaning. This is because not everyone in a college is graduating or receiving a degree that took the same amount of effort to get.

You have different colors on the robes dependent on the different discipline the student studied. So people who studied science classes have a color, and those who are graduating from medical classes have another. Then you have different colors and the shapes of the hoods change in reference to the amount of years the person has been attending school and the level of education they are said to have. So people who are receiving their bachelor’s degree do not have the same identical attire as those who have a higher degree like a PhD. These subtle changes in the outfits makes it possible for you to tell the status of one faculty member from another with ease.