Courtesy of NC A&T State University
First Lady Michelle Obama has been tapped to deliver the address for North Carolina Agricultural and Technical State University’s spring commencement, Saturday, May 12, at the Greensboro Coliseum. The doors open at 7:30 a.m. This year, N.C. A&T will graduate more than 1,000 students across nine schools and colleges.
“We are honored and delighted that First Lady Michelle Obama will be joining us as the speaker for our spring commencement ceremonies," said Dr. Harold L. Martin Sr., A&T Chancellor. "This will be a historic occasion that the graduates and their guests will not soon forget."
Mrs. Obama is a product of the Chicago public schools. She studied sociology and African American studies at Princeton University in New Jersey. She went on to earn a law degree from Harvard Law School in 1988 and then joined the Chicago law firm Sidley & Austin, where she later met the man who would become her husband and the nation’s first African American president.
She worked as an attorney for a few years before deciding to work with people to serve their communities and neighbors. She has served as assistant commissioner of planning and development in Chicago's City Hall before becoming the founding executive director of the Chicago chapter of Public Allies, an AmeriCorps program that prepares youth for public service.
In 1996, Mrs. Obama joined the University of Chicago. As associate dean of student services, she developed the university's first community service program. Under her leadership as vice president of community and external affairs for the University of Chicago Medical Center, volunteerism greatly increased.
In 2010, she launched the “Let’s Move!” campaign to bring together community leaders, teachers, doctors, nurses, moms and dads in a nationwide effort to tackle the challenge of childhood obesity. The goal is to solve the epidemic of childhood obesity within a generation.
Last year, Mrs. Obama and Dr. Jill Biden launched Joining Forces, a nationwide initiative that mobilizes all sectors of society to raise awareness of military families' unique needs and to give service members and their families the opportunities and support they have earned. Joining Forces has been working hand in hand with American businesses that are committed to answering the President's challenge to hire or train 100,000 unemployed veterans and military spouses by 2013.
The First Lady and President Obama have two daughters, Malia, 13, and Sasha, 10.
Posted By: Reginald Culpepper
Tuesday, May 1st 2012 at 1:31PM
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