Tennessee State University held a reimagined fall 2025 commencement that split graduation into three, smaller ceremonies to increase access and intimacy for graduates and families. President Duane Tucker said the format was chosen to "showcase the quality of the students that come out of Tennessee State," and asked student leaders to address the crowd.

The ceremonies front‑loaded student voices. Aaliyah Cotton, speaking for the College of Agriculture, used a soil metaphor to credit faculty, staff and alumni for nurturing students, saying, "It is this soil that has produced some of the nation's best faculty, staff, admin, and alumni." Cotton described her major in agricultural science with an environmental concentration and framed her future work around environmental justice.

A speaker for the College of Health Sciences, later listed among candidates as Leslie Marie Adams, described TSU as "holy ground" for those training in caregiving professions and said she will continue as a registered nurse at Grady Memorial Hospital. Jada Alexis Daniel, representing the College of Liberal Arts, called her TSU experience an "Odyssey," described overcoming personal struggle with support from campus groups and family, and said she will begin work as a news reporter in Fayetteville, Arkansas.

Academic honors were recognized: the dean of the Honors College asked students with a GPA of 3.0 and above to stand and the ceremony detailed cum/laude thresholds (3.25–3.49), magna (3.5–3.74) and summa (3.75–4.0). Deans from the colleges presented candidates for degrees and President Tucker conferred their bachelor of arts and bachelor of science degrees "by the authority vested in me by the state of Tennessee, through the Tennessee State University Board of Trustees." The presiding officer instructed graduates to turn their tassels from the right to the left to signify conferral.

Katrina Kerr, president of the Tennessee State University National Alumni Association, administered an alumni pledge and invited graduates to claim a complimentary one‑year membership via the alumni website. The program closed with a benediction, the alma mater and acknowledgments of volunteers including AVP Johnny Smith and AVP Eddie Chris for co‑chairing the reimagined commencement program.

The ceremony emphasized student achievement, institutional traditions and next steps for graduates; no formal votes or policy decisions were recorded during the program.