Dr. Madeleine Albright, former U.S. Secretary of State, will deliver the main address at this year's Commencement exercises. Albright will receive an honorary degree from Dartmouth College as a Doctor of Laws.
Albright served as the 64th Secretary of State from 1997 to 2001 under the Clinton administration. She was the first female to hold the position and is the highest-ranking woman in U.S. government history.
"We are very excited to have Dr. Albright come speak, she is a major figure in the history of the United States," said Roland Adams, the director of news and public information for the College.
Although Adams did not know what Albright plans to talk about, he said, "we know she will be a very good speaker."During Albright's tenure, America led efforts to expand and modernize NATO as well as tried to reverse ethnic cleansing in Kosovo.
Other achievements during her term include the promotion of peace in the Middle East and Northern Ireland, working to reduce nuclear danger in Russia and North Korea, and enhancing relations with China, while pressing for change in the area of human rights.
Albright is now a Professor of Diplomacy at Georgetown University's School of Foreign Service as well as the Chairman of the Board of the National Democratic Institution. She is also writing a book and pursuing public policy activities.
This year, honorary degrees will also be awarded to Myrlie Evers-Williams, a civil rights leader and former chair of the NAACP, Donald Hall, former poet laureate of New Hampshire, Michael Heyman, secretary of the Smithsonian Institution and 1951 Dartmouth graduate, Phyllis Lambert, a leading architect, and James Watson.
Watson, along with his colleague Francis Crick, discovered the double helix structure of DNA in 1953. Watson and Crick won the Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine in 1962.
Honorary degree recipients are chosen by a committee of three representatives from each of the three academic disciplines and three representatives from the three professional schools. The Committee on Honorary Degrees receives nominations from faculty, graduating seniors and graduate students.
College President James Wright and the Board of Trustees then chose from the list of potential recipients drawn up by the committee.
