Spelman College announced today that actress, director and
executive producer Angela Bassett will be the keynote speaker for
the College’s 137th Commencement Ceremony and will receive a
Doctor of Fine Arts honorary degree. The College will also award an
honorary degree – Doctor of Laws - to trailblazing Supreme Court
Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson, as well as a National Community
Service Award to highly acclaimed Atlanta journalist Rose Scott
during
Commencement at 3 p.m., Sunday, May 19,
at the Georgia International Convention Center (GICC). The
renowned social justice minister Reverend Dr. Yvette Flunder will
address graduates during the
Baccalaureate Ceremony at 10
a.m., Saturday, May 18, also at the GICC.
Bassett, an Honorary Oscar recipient, is known for captivating
performances in iconic films, such as Malcolm X, Waiting to Exhale,
How Stella Got Her Groove Back, Black Panther, Mission Impossible:
Fallout, and What’s Love Got to Do With It, for which she received
an Academy Award nomination. Bassett returned as the beloved Queen
Ramonda in Black Panther: Wakanda Forever, and received Golden
Globe, Critics Choice, and NAACP Image Entertainer of the Year
awards with Academy Award, SAG and BAFTA nominations, as well as
the Variety Creative Impact in Acting Award. She is also the star
and executive producer of the ABC/Disney hit drama 9-1-1, the
recently released Netflix Originals blockbuster feature film
Damsel, and is narrator of the critically acclaimed NatGeo limited
series Queens.
Bassett was named one of the Time 100 and Time Women of the Year
in 2023, has earned multiple EMMY nominations and is the recipient
of numerous awards, including a SAG Award, 16 NAACP Image Awards,
two Golden Globe Awards, the Black Girls Rock! Icon Award, and many
more.
“Spelman College is honored to have acclaimed actress and
director Angela Bassett to bring words of inspiration to our
graduating Class of 2024,” said Spelman College President Helene D.
Gayle, M.D., MPH. “Her work has had a tremendous impact
both on and off the screen and serves as an example for our
students to lead in their own spaces. We are equally honored to
have a slate of strong Black women join us for our weekend
ceremonies, including Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson, Atlanta
community icon Rose Scott and the esteemed Reverend Dr. Yvette
Flunder. We look forward to them inspiring our graduates, their
families and the Spelman community.”
The Class of 2024 includes 504 degree candidates, receiving 325
Bachelor of Arts and 179 Bachelor of Science degrees.
Class of 2024 Top Ten Scholars and Majors
Mika Keziah Campbell, co-Valedictorian,
MathematicsNadia Scott, co-Valedictorian, HistoryNailah Johnson,
Salutatorian, PsychologyAlyssa Rodriquez, BiochemistryZoli Smith,
PsychologyBeulah Andoh, PsychologyKinka Kimfon, Health ScienceErin
Grier, EnglishRabiah Hubert, PsychologyRaegan Ewing, International
Studies
2024 Honorary DegreeKetanji Brown Jackson,
associate justice, was born in Washington, D.C., on September
14, 1970. She received an A.B., magna cum laude, from
Harvard-Radcliffe College in 1992, and a J.D., cum laude, from
Harvard Law School in 1996. She served as a law clerk for Judge
Patti B. Saris of the U.S. District Court for the District of
Massachusetts from 1996 to 1997, Judge Bruce M. Selya of the U.S.
Court of Appeals for the First Circuit from 1997 to 1998, and
Justice Stephen G. Breyer of the Supreme Court of the United States
during the 1999 Term.
After three years in private practice, she worked
as an attorney at the U.S. Sentencing Commission from 2003 to 2005.
From 2005 to 2007, she served as an assistant federal public
defender in Washington, D.C., and from 2007 to 2010, she was in
private practice. She served as a vice chair and commissioner on
the U.S. Sentencing Commission from 2010 to 2014. In 2012,
President Barack Obama nominated her to the U.S. District Court for
the District of Columbia, where she served from 2013 to 2021. She
was appointed to the Defender Services Committee of the Judicial
Conference of the United States in 2017, and the Supreme Court
Fellows Commission in 2019. President Joseph R. Biden, Jr.,
appointed her to the United States Court of Appeals for the
District of Columbia Circuit in 2021 and then nominated her as an
associate justice of the Supreme Court in 2022. She took her seat
on June 30, 2022.
National Community Service AwardSpelman
will also honor Rose Scott with the National Community Service
Award for her almost two decades of public service as an
award-winning journalist, a “curator of communication
conversations” and a voice of accountability for local and national
issues. Scott is the executive producer and host of the midday news
program “Closer Look” broadcast on Atlanta’s NPR station, 90.1 FM –
WABE. She joined WABE full-time in 2008. Prior to that, Scott began
her public media career in 1999 at WCLK 91.9 FM at Clark Atlanta
University.
“Closer Look” has become a signature broadcast for
the community and brings together viewpoints from all sectors of
society. In her role as executive producer and host, Scott has
interviewed foreign heads of state, cabinet members, U.S.
ambassadors, numerous consul generals, state, and local elected
officials as well as civic and social leaders.
Baccalaureate Ceremony Reverend Dr.
Yvette Flunder will serve as the speaker for the Baccalaureate
Ceremony the day before Commencement. The Baccalaureate Ceremony is
the final spiritual experience for Spelman College students. It
provides the opportunity for the graduating class, along with their
families and communities, to joyfully reflect on their spiritual
growth and personal transformation as they prepare for Commencement
on the following day.
Rev. Dr. Flunder founded the City of Refuge United
Church of Christ in 1991. In 2003, Flunder was consecrated
Presiding Bishop of The Fellowship of Affirming Ministries, a
multi-denominational coalition of over 100 primarily African
American Christian leaders and laity. Bishop Flunder is a graduate
of the Certificate of Ministry and Master of Arts programs at
Pacific School of Religion and received her Doctor of Ministry from
San Francisco Theological Seminary. She has also served as an
adjunct professor and speaker at Pacific School of Religion and
numerous seminaries and universities including Auburn, Brite
Divinity, Chicago Theological, Columbia University, Drew, Duke,
Eden, Howard, Lancaster, New York Theological, and Yale.
For more information and to learn more about our
speakers and Commencement activities, go to Schedule of Events
(spelman.edu).
Media CredentialsMembers of the media
interested in covering Spelman’s 2024 Commencement activities
should complete a Media Credentials Request form by Friday, May 10.
You can complete the form here: Request Media Credentials |
Spelman College
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About Spelman College Founded in
1881, Spelman College is a leading liberal arts college widely
recognized as the global leader in the education of women of
African descent. Located in Atlanta, the College’s picturesque
campus is home to 2,300 students. Spelman is the country's leading
producer of Black women who complete Ph.D.s in science, technology,
engineering, and math (STEM). The College’s status is
confirmed by the U.S. News & World Report, which
ranked Spelman No. 39 among all liberal arts colleges, No. 19 for
undergraduate teaching, No. 2 for social mobility among liberal
arts colleges, and No. 1 for the 17th year among historically Black
colleges and universities. Recent initiatives include a
designation by the Department of Defense as a Center of Excellence
for Minority Women in STEM, a Gender and Sexuality Studies
Institute, the first endowed queer studies chair at an HBCU and a
program to increase the number of Black women Ph.D.s in economics.
New majors and minors have been added, including documentary
filmmaking and photography, data science, refugee studies and
gaming. Collaborations have been also established with MIT’s Media
Lab, the Broad Institute and the Army Research Lab for artificial
intelligence and machine learning, among others.Outstanding alumnae
include Children’s Defense Fund founder Marian Wright Edelman,
former Walgreens Boots Alliance CEO Rosalind Brewer, political
leader Stacey Abrams, Federal Reserve
Governor Lisa D. Cook, former Acting Surgeon
General and Spelman’s first alumna president Audrey Forbes
Manley, Harvard University professor and former
Dean Evelynn Hammonds, actress and
producer Latanya Richardson Jackson, global bioinformatics
geneticist Janina Jeff and authors Pearl
Cleage and Tayari Jones.To learn more, please
visit spelman.edu and @spelmancollege on social
media.
- Angela Bassett
- Supreme Court Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson
Denise Ward
Spelman College
770.862.4028
deniseward@spelman.edu