The USC Marshall School of Business alumni network — already more than 100,000 strong — will soon welcome over 2,000 new graduates.
On May 17, the USC Marshall School of Business will celebrate the Class of 2025 in a joint commencement ceremony honoring both undergraduate and graduate students at the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum. Well-suited for the larger ceremony, this year’s USC Marshall commencement speaker will be entertainment icon, entrepreneur, and philanthropist Snoop Dogg.
Student speakers play an important role in commencement, offering a voice for the graduating class and capturing the spirit of the moment through shared stories and forward-looking inspiration. Selected for this special honor, Drew Liddell, a business administration major, and Jonathan Dennill, a part-time MBA (MBAPM) student, will serve as student speakers at the joint ceremony, sharing reflections on their time at USC Marshall while looking ahead to exciting careers after graduation.
Liddell’s speech will draw on themes of competition learned in BUAD 498: The Game Is Life, co-taught by former USC head football coach Pete Carroll, USC Dean of Religious and Spiritual Life Varun Soni, and Adjunct Professor of Entrepreneurship David Belasco. Just as Carroll has inspired Liddell, the undergraduate speaker hopes his remarks at commencement will inspire others within the Marshall community.
“I want to remind [the Class of 2025] how good of competitors we are, and as we transition into a broader arena that is the entire world, how we can keep that same mentality and compete for everything we want to do,” Liddell said. “There’s truly no goal or dream that is out of our reach.”
Liddell says he was inspired to pursue his ambitions while at USC Marshall, developing the self-confidence needed to start Onward USC, a student-led organization dedicated to educating students about careers in corporate America. After graduation, Liddell will work as a consultant at PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) in downtown Los Angeles.
Liddell is quick to acknowledge that he didn’t earn his success on his own.
“Even though I am an individual on that stage, it wasn’t my journey alone that got me there,” Liddell said. “It’s all those people who encourage me. It’s all the faculty and staff who told me they were going to practice with me, who told me they believed in me as well. It’s my coworkers who, working this past year in the Marshall admissions office, showed me how much they value my experience and value what I have to share with the next generation of Trojans.”
Similar to Liddell, part-time MBA student Dennill has made meaningful strides during his time at USC Marshall. Although he began his journey working in the entertainment industry, after graduation he will transition to a management consultant position at Deloitte — a career pivot Dennill credits to the USC Marshall classroom experience. According to the graduate student speaker, the intelligence and capabilities of his classmates and professors offered him a glimpse of a new career path.