{"id":311254,"date":"2026-10-21T20:54:07","date_gmt":"2026-10-21T20:54:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/311254\/"},"modified":"2026-10-21T20:54:07","modified_gmt":"2026-10-21T20:54:07","slug":"pennsylvania-house-declares-one-million-degrees-day","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/311254\/","title":{"rendered":"Pennsylvania House Declares ‘One Million Degrees Day’"},"content":{"rendered":"

We officially have a \u201cOne Million Degrees Day.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Pennsylvania House of Representatives passed a resolution designating August 15, 2026, as \u201cOne Million Degrees Day\u201d in Pennsylvania to commemorate Penn State\u2019s milestone of granting its one millionth degree this summer<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Penn State is the third university in the United States to surpass the one million mark, joining Michigan and Indiana.<\/p>\n

The House resolution\u2019s prime sponsor was Paul Takac, a Centre County and 82nd District representative, along with 27 co-sponsors.<\/p>\n

\u201cOne million Penn State degrees represent generations of educational opportunity and lasting contributions to communities throughout Pennsylvania, the nation and the world,\u201d the resolution states. <\/p>\n

The milestone came 170 years after Penn State was founded in 1855 as the Farmers\u2019 High School and 165 years since the university awarded its first Bachelor of Science in Agriculture degrees to 11 students in 1861.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis remarkable milestone honors the lasting legacy of Penn State\u2019s past graduates, while illustrating the University\u2019s ongoing commitment to educate, empower and support future generations,\u201d Penn State President Neeli Bendapudi said in a news release<\/a> at the time.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are incredibly proud of our alumni, whose achievements and leadership are making a profound difference in communities across Pennsylvania. Our newest graduates \u2014 like those before them and those still to come \u2014 join a remarkable network of Penn Staters committed to the pursuit of knowledge, community impact and service, and we can\u2019t wait to see how they continue to change the world.\u201d<\/p>\n

More than 430,000 Penn State alumni work in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, and the university and its alumni support more than 10% of state jobs. The university also generates more than $15.8 billion annually for Pennsylvania\u2019s economy.<\/p>\n

When the degree was granted in August, Gov. Josh Shapiro issued a statewide proclamation marking the historic milestone and Penn State\u2019s impact across Pennsylvania. <\/p>\n

Local proclamations were also made. <\/p>\n

\t\"\"\t<\/p>\n

Lily is a third-year majoring in broadcast journalism and political science. She is from Allentown Pennsylvania enjoys anything outdoors and politics. You can find her on Instagram @lilymcafeee or email [email\u00a0protected]<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"We officially have a \u201cOne Million Degrees Day.\u201d The Pennsylvania House of Representatives passed a resolution designating August…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":311255,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[127340,627,2479,2816,30967,22947,41084,23094,139,112469,23973,58201,3743,28,30,5634,29,23985,127341,24781,13189,18154],"class_list":["post-311254","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-pennsylvania","tag-127340","tag-alumni","tag-commonwealth","tag-degree","tag-degrees","tag-graduation","tag-historic","tag-milestone","tag-news","tag-one-million-degrees","tag-onward-state","tag-paul-takac","tag-penn-state","tag-pennsylvania","tag-pennsylvania-headlines","tag-pennsylvania-house-of-representatives","tag-pennsylvania-news","tag-psu","tag-psu-milestones","tag-resolution","tag-state-college","tag-state-government"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/311254","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=311254"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/311254\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/311255"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=311254"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=311254"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=311254"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}