This spring, the College of Engineering celebrated with 205 undergraduates, 34 masters degree students and 12 PhD students who completed the requirements for their respective degrees. This was a record number of undergraduates attending Convocation at the Neal Blaisdell Center on May 11, 2018.
The College’s unofficial total number of degrees granted is over 11,900 (undergraduate and graduate combined). The first degree, a BS, was awarded in 1912 to Yong Fook Tong. According to the College’s Centennial History, “Shortly after the move to the new campus, the College held its first graduation ceremony. Unfortunately none of the original five students managed to graduate. Other students had replaced the original five, and among these was Yong Fook Tong, the College’s first engineering graduate. Tong was listed on College rolls as a resident of Maunawai, O‘ahu, a coastal area of Waimea Bay. Yong Fook Tong left Hawai‘i and is known to have been employed as an “office engineer” at the Armstrong Brothers in New York City until around 1920. Sometime after 1920, Yong Fook Tong moved to China and by 1928 was employed as chief engineer of the China United Engineering Corporation in Shanghai, an agent of the Truscon Steel Company of Youngstown, Ohio.”
