Baldwin City ? Standing early Sunday afternoon outside of the Collins Center soon after he received his bachelor’s of arts degree from Baker University, Christian Allen suddenly realized his day had another significance.

By virtue of alphabetical order, Allen was the first Baker student to receive his degree from the school’s new president, Lynne Murray.

“I think that’s awesome,” said Allen, a cum laude biology graduate who will now look for work in a research lab. “I’ll be the only one with that distinction.”

The Lawrence native was one of 232 students to receive bachelor’s degrees Sunday during the university’s fall 2014 commencement. More than 250 graduate students were honored later in the afternoon.

In brief remarks at the commencement, Murray stayed close to the graduation script of predecessor Pat Long. She recognized the graduates, the school’s faculty, its administrators and, at the ceremony’s end, the parents, family members, spouses, partners and friends who supported the new graduates while they pursued their education.

In his commencement address, Tony Miller told the graduates they would continue to find support in the education they received at Baker and from the past graduates. A 1998 graduate, Miller went on to become a co-founder of the Troppito Miller Griffin Law Firm in Kansas City and was recently elected to the Jackson County, Mo., Legislature.

“We have all of us been blessed with experiencing the transformative education with a critical thinking focus and an insightful curriculum and with the intangibles the Baker experience instills — that network of people regionally, nationally and worldwide that you are a part of,” he said.

The critical thinking and communication skills learned at Baker would help the students successfully cope with the three to four “reinventions” they faced in their career lifetimes, Miller said.

His introduction to the Baker community came through late Baker football coach Charlie Richards and such people as former university president Dan Lambert and his late wife, Carolyn Lambert, who gave hands-on instruction to male students on how to dress, eat and communicate, as well as the proper behavioral protocol for former British Prime Minister Margret Thatcher’s 1996 visit to the campus for the dedication of Osborne Chapel, Miller said.

Soon after the ceremony, graduate Renata Dill said she would leave Baldwin City for Paola, where she would work for six weeks as a para-professional in the local school district while waiting for her substitute teaching license.

It was the closeness of the Baker community that attracted her to the school from her Manhattan home four-and-a-half years ago, Dill said.

“I decided to come to play softball and volleyball,” said the elementary education graduate. “But after my first visit, I fell in love with the campus and atmosphere. It was the right fit for me.”