- graduate
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—graduator, n.n.1. a person who has received a degree or diploma on completing a course of study, as in a university, college, or school.2. a student who holds the bachelor's or the first professional degree and is studying for an advanced degree.3. a cylindrical or tapering graduated container, used for measuring.adj.4. of, pertaining to, or involved in academic study beyond the first or bachelor's degree: graduate courses in business; a graduate student.5. having an academic degree or diploma: a graduate engineer.v.i.6. to receive a degree or diploma on completing a course of study (often fol. by from): She graduated from college in 1985.7. to pass by degrees; change gradually.v.t.8. to confer a degree upon, or to grant a diploma to, at the close of a course of study, as in a university, college, or school: Cornell graduated eighty students with honors.9. Informal. to receive a degree or diploma from: She graduated college in 1950.10. to arrange in grades or gradations; establish gradation in.11. to divide into or mark with degrees or other divisions, as the scale of a thermometer.[1375-1425; late ME < ML graduatus (ptp. of graduare), equiv. to grad(us) GRADE, step + -u- thematic vowel + -atus -ATE1]Usage. In the sense "to receive a degree or diploma" GRADUATE followed by FROM is the most common construction today: Her daughter graduated from Yale in 1981. The passive form WAS GRADUATED FROM, formerly insisted upon as the only correct pattern, has decreased in use and occurs infrequently today: My husband was graduated from West Point last year.Even though it is condemned by some as nonstandard, the use of GRADUATE as a transitive verb meaning "to receive a degree or diploma from" is increasing in frequency in both speech and writing: The twins graduated high school in 1974.
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Universalium. 2010.