Northwest Mississippi Community College

State Sen. Gray Tollison of Oxford will serve as keynote speaker for Northwest Community College’s 100th Commencement Exercises on Friday, May 13, at the Howard Coliseum on the Senatobia campus.

Tollison is currently serving in Mississippi’s State Senate District 9, which encompasses Lafayette and Panola counties, and has served in the Mississippi Senate since 1996.

Tollison was first elected to the Mississippi State Senate in 1995 and recently completed his 21st legislative session. He is 11th in seniority of 52 senators and has authored over 130 state laws. Tollison has previously served as chair of the Constitution and Judiciary “B” Committees. As chair of the Judiciary “B” committee, he worked to improve teen driver safety laws and passed the primary seat belt law that has resulted in increased seat belt usage in Mississippi.

As part of a sixth-generation family from Lafayette County, Tollison grew up in Oxford and is a 1982 graduate of Oxford High School. After completing his undergraduate studies at Rhodes College in 1986, he received his Juris Doctorate from The University of Mississippi. He has worked for his family law firm for the past 25 years. He and his wife, Amanda Jones Tollison, have two children — Grady, a freshman in college, and Laurel, a junior at Oxford High School.

The Associate of Arts ceremony will be at 8 a.m.; the Career Certificate at 11:30 a.m. and the Associate of Applied Science will be held at 2:30 p.m.