Thursday,
April 29, 2004
Lincoln
University Presents 145th Commencement, Sunday, May 2
U.S.
Secretary of Education Rod Paige will be the Keynote Speaker.
The University will Award Honorary Degrees to Three Distinguished
Achievers: Chief Secretary to the Treasury of Britain; IBM Executive
and Former Lincoln Board Chair; and a Pioneer Veterinarian and
last Living Member of the U.S. Army’s Elite “Buffalo
Soldiers.”
LINCOLN
UNIVERSITY, PA (www.lincoln.edu) -- Lincoln University, celebrating
its sesquicentennial (150th) anniversary as America's first Historically
Black University, will present its 145th commencement on Sunday,
May 2, 2004, at 2:00 p.m., on the infield of the University’s
track and field complex in southern Chester County, Pennsylvania.
One hundred and sixty-five seniors will receive baccalaureate
degrees and 157 students will be awarded their master's degrees.
Lincoln’s commencement will be highlighted by a keynote address
from the Honorable Dr. Rod Paige, U.S. Secretary of Education.
The University will also present honorary degrees to the following
three distinguished awardees: Adrienne G. Rhone, a 1976
cum laude Lincoln graduate, and chair of the Lincoln Board of
Trustees from 1999-2003; the Honorable Paul Boateng, Chief
Secretary to the Treasury of Britain; and pioneer veterinarian
Dr. William Henry Waddell, a 1931 Lincoln graduate, and member
of the U.S. Army’s elite, all-Black Cavalry unit, the “Buffalo
Soldiers.”
~
The Honorable Dr. Rod Paige ~
2004 Commencement Speaker
On January
21, 2001, the United States Senate confirmed Dr. Rod Paige as
the 7th U.S. Secretary of Education. For Paige, the son of a principal
and a librarian in Mississippi public schools, that day was the
crowning achievement of a long career in education. He earned
a bachelor's degree from Jackson State University in his home
state. He then earned both a master's and a doctoral degree from
Indiana University. Paige began working with students early in
his career as a teacher and a coach. He then served for a decade
as dean of the College of Education at Texas Southern University
(TSU). Elected in 1989, Dr. Paige was sworn in as a trustee and
an officer of the Board of Education of the Houston Independent
School District (HISD) in January 1990, in which capacities he
served until 1994.
In 1994,
Dr. Paige left TSU to become superintendent of HISD, the nation's
seventh largest school district. His vast experience as a practitioner—from
the blackboard to the boardroom—paid off during the long
hours of work needed to pass President Bush's No Child Left
Behind Act of 2001 (NCLB). Now he is leading the charge—in
partnership with states and districts—to implement these
historic reforms. The law will give local districts the tools
and resources they need to help every child learn, regardless
of the color of their skin or the accent of their speech. The
driving force behind his work as Secretary is his shared belief
with President Bush that education is a civil right, just like
the right to vote or to be treated equally.
~
The Honorable Paul Boateng---Doctor of Laws Honorary Degree ~
The Honorable
Paul Boateng, Chief Secretary to the Treasury of Britain, was
born in Accra, Ghana in 1951, the son of Kwaku Boateng, a distinguished
barrister and evangelist and member of President Kwame Nkrumah’s
cabinet 1961-1966 and his Scottish wife, Eleanor, a Quaker teacher.
He was educated at Ghana International School and Accra Academy
until 1966 when he and his mother fled to Britain after his father
was imprisoned by the perpetrators of the military coup against
Nkrumah. Nkrumah, a 1939 Lincoln graduate, was Ghana’s first
president.
By the early 1980s, Mr. Boateng became a partner in a distinguished
London law firm, but continued his tireless advocacy on behalf
of young Britons of color against the apartheid regime in South
Africa. In 1981, he entered public life as an elected member of
the Greater London Council where he served from 1981 to 1986.
There, he served as chairman of the Police Committee and vice
chairman of the Ethnic Minorities Committee. From 1989 through
1997, Boateng worked in the British Parliament where he served
as a spokesman on treasury, economic and legal affairs. In 1998,
Mr. Boateng was promoted to become Minister of State at the Home
Office (the equivalent of the U.S. Justice Department) with responsibilities
for policing. In 1999, he was promoted again to become Deputy
Home Secretary with additional responsibility for prisons and
probations policy. In June 2001, he was promoted to Financial
Secretary to the Treasury and also was made a member of Her Majesty’s
Privy Council.
~
Adrienne G. Rhone ’76---Doctor of Humane Letters Honorary Degree
~
Adrienne
G. Rhone, a 1976 cum laude graduate of Lincoln University with
a B.A. in English, is the Manager of Government Relations for
the International Business Machines (IBM) Corporation, Governmental
Programs office, located in Washington, D.C. Mrs. Rhone manages
a team of government relations professionals focused on the breadth
of public policy issues affecting the company (tax, market access,
intellectual property, e-commerce, R&D investment, and human
resources). Mrs. Rhone has progressed through a range of opportunities
in her 16-year career with IBM. Mrs. Rhone is the first woman
to chair Lincoln University's Board of Trustees (1999 to 2003).
She is a life member of the General Alumni Association of Lincoln
University and a past officer of the D.C. Alumni Chapter.
Prior to
IBM, she worked for seven years on Capitol Hill as the press secretary
to the Honorable Louis Stokes, (D-OH). During that stint, the
former Rep. Stokes chaired the House Assassinations Committee,
the House Committee on Standards of Official Conduct, the House
Intelligence Committee, the House HUD-Independent Agencies Appropriations
Subcommittee, as well as Chairman of the Congressional Black Caucus
Foundation and Dean of the Ohio Congressional Delegation. In 1996,
she was a recipient of an Alumni Achievement Award from Lincoln’s
General Alumni Association.
~
Dr. William Henry Waddell, IV ‘31---Doctor of Science Honorary
Degree ~
Dr. William
Henry Waddell, IV ’31 is a pioneer in the field of veterinary
medicine. One of the first blacks to practice veterinary medicine
in the United States, Dr. Waddell is co-founder of the Tuskegee
Institute School of Veterinary Medicine. In between his collegiate
and veterinarian careers, Dr. Waddell served honorably as a member
of the U.S. Army’s heralded “Buffalo Soldiers”
from 1941-1946 in North Africa. Originally established by Congress
as the U.S. Army’s 9th and 10th Cavalries after the Civil
War, the Buffalo Soldiers were an all-black, mounted regiment
who protected work crews installing telegraph and railroad lines
across the Western Frontier.
Dr. Waddell
went on to earn numerous national and state accolades, including
citations from the governors of West Virginia and North Dakota
for diagnosis and eradication of tuberculosis in cattle. Dr. Waddell,
a 1931 graduate of Lincoln University, became a board certified
veterinarian in Pennsylvania after receiving his doctorate of
veterinarian medicine from the University of Pennsylvania in 1935.
Dr. Waddell was the first black to practice veterinary medicine
in West Virginia. Dr. Waddell is the first black member of the
American Veterinary Medicine Association and the first black commissioned
member of the Officer Reserve Veterinary Corps.
Founded
in 1854, Lincoln is America's first Historically Black University
and is nationally recognized as a major producer of African Americans
with undergraduate degrees in the physical sciences (biology,
chemistry and physics); computer and informational sciences; biological
and life sciences. The University is in the midst of a yearlong
celebration of its sesquicentennial. Lincoln enrolls approximately
2,000 undergraduate and graduate students. For more information
on the University, please log onto our Web site, www. lincoln.edu.
Contact: Howard G. Kelly, Jr., assistant director, Office of Marketing
& Communications. (610) 721-3829 (mobile). * * * *
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