[219] Fall 2017 MTSU grads will hear recipe for success Saturday from famed chef Chauhan

MURFREESBORO, Tenn. — Famed chef, restauranteur and artisan brewery founder Maneet Chauhan will share her recipe for success with an estimated 1,737 MTSU students receiving their degrees in two fall 2017 commencement ceremonies set this Saturday, Dec. 16.

Chauhan, a featured judge on the hit Food Network show “Chopped,” is also a business partner with MTSU’s new Fermentation Science Program via her Life Is Brewing company, which is offering its Murfreesboro-based Hop Springs agritourism complex and Steel Barrel Brewery facility for fermentation and sensory labs.

A multi-award-winning graduate of the Culinary Institute of America, Chauhan has worked in some of the finest hotels and restaurants in India and the United States. She is chef and owner of Chauhan Ale and Masala House in Nashville and formed Morph Hospitality Group in 2016, which opened the Tansuo and Mockingbird restaurants in Nashville’s Gulch neighborhood.

Chauhan, who lives in Franklin, Tennessee, with her family, mentors new Culinary Institute graduates and is involved with the educational arm of the National Restaurant Association's ProStart program for high school students. She also is an active supporter of various charities and locally was the 2016 event chair for the March of Dimes Signature Chef Auction.

During Saturday’s commencement exercises, students from the College of Graduate Studies, College of Basic and Applied Sciences, the Jones College of Business and the College of Education will receive their degrees in the morning ceremony.

Students in the College of Behavioral and Health Sciences, College of Liberal Arts, College of Media and Entertainment, and the University College will receive their degrees in the afternoon event.

The MTSU Registrar’s Office reported this week that of the 1,737 students set to graduate Saturday, 1,514 are undergraduates and 223 are graduate students, including 196 master’s candidates, 10 education-specialist recipients and 17 doctoral candidates. Three graduate students also will be receiving graduate certificates.

An official program listing all the graduates is available at http://ow.ly/dfWk30bgTyW.

MTSU’s commencement ceremonies are always free and open to the public. Friends, families and supporters who can’t attend in person can watch each ceremony live online Dec. 16 via streaming video.

The closed-captioned video stream will be available only on Dec. 16 and will begin about 15 minutes before each ceremony starts; visit http://ow.ly/rwxOz for more details.

MTSU’s Graduation Committee noted that all graduating students must stay for their entire commencement ceremony. Each ceremony may last up to three hours.

Guests attending each ceremony are being asked to arrive early to ease traffic congestion around Murphy Center and to help ensure comfortable seating for everyone inside Hale Arena. Motorists should avoid Middle Tennessee Boulevard because of ongoing construction.

Graduation information — including links to maps and driving directions to Murphy Center, cap-and-gown information, official photographs and contacts for the Registrar’s Office — is available anytime at http://www.mtsunews.com/graduation-info.