Commencement

//kəˈmɛnsmənt// noun

noun ·Moderate ·College level

Definitions

Noun
  1. 1
    The first existence of anything; act or fact of commencing; the beginning. countable, uncountable

    "The time of Henry VII nearly coincides with the commencement of what is termed modern history."

  2. 2
    the act of starting something wordnet
  3. 3
    The day when degrees are conferred by colleges and universities upon students and others. countable, uncountable
  4. 4
    an academic exercise in which diplomas are conferred wordnet
  5. 5
    A graduation ceremony, from a school, college or university. Sometimes before the actual graduation. countable, uncountable
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  1. 6
    the time at which something is supposed to begin wordnet

Synonyms

All synonyms
beginningbeginningconvocationstartaalpha

Example

More examples

"With North Korea's announcement on the 26th of its nuclear development plan based upon the agreement stemming from the Six Party Talks, and the United States' commencement of procedures to remove North Korea from its designation on the list of State Sponsors of Terrorism, the families of abductees have expressed growing unease that it may constitute an abandonment of the abductee issue."

Etymology

From French commencement; analyzable as commence + -ment.

Related phrases

graduation ceremonywhen you

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Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.