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Knox College Honorary Degrees

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Knox College awarded its first honorary doctorate to Abraham Lincoln in 1860; previously it awarded honorary master's degrees. Early records do not specify that every commencement speaker received an honorary degree; until the late 1920s, commencement addresses were often given by students from the graduating class. In some years, "Master's Orations" were given by alumni of the College.

Commencement speakers in italics.

2021

Ngozi O. Ezike, director of the Illinois Department of Public Health
Jennifer Lippincott-Schwartz, senior group leader at Howard Hughes Medical Institute's Janelia Research Campus and a founding member of the Neuronal Cell Biology Program at Janelia
Tom Rivett-Carnac, a founding partner of Global Optimism and an architect of the United Nations Paris Agreement on Climate Change

2020

Brian Wallach and Sandra Abrevaya, the founders of I AM ALS, a patient-led, patient-centric movement created to find a cure for ALS after Brian was diagnosed with the disease.

2019

Bridget C. Coughlin, President and Chief Executive Officer of Shedd Aquarium
Gloria J. Ladson-Billings, Pedagogical Theorist and President of the National Academy of Education
Matt Wilson, Musician and Educator

2018

Vir Das '02, India's Premier Comedian
Mary Margaret McCarthy, Executive Director, National Immigrant Justice Center
Michael W. Young, Rockefeller University Vice President for Academic Affairs, Nobel Prize-Winning Geneticist

2017

Eva Longoria, Award-Winning Actor, Producer, and Philanthropist
Ambassador Fay Hartog-Levin (Ret.), Distinguished Fellow, Chicago Council of Global Affairs
Wes Jackson,Co-Founder and President Emeritus of The Land Institute

2016

Richard J. Durbin , United States Senator from the State of Illinois
Chad Pregracke, Founder of Living Lands & Waters, a nonprofit organization dedicated to cleaning up and preserving our nation's rivers
Brenda J. Child, Author and Historian of American Indian History

2015

William Whitaker, Emmy Award-winning journalist and "60 Minutes" correspondent
Matt Berg '00, co-founder and chief executive officer of the social enterprise technology company Ona
June Cross, Emmy Award-winning producer and writer and professor at Columbia University's Graduate School of Journalism

2014

Natasha Trethewey, Pulitzer Prize winner in Poetry and Nineteenth Poet Laureate of the United States
Alan Harn, Assistant Curator of Anthropology at the Dickson Mounds Museum
Ramsey Lewis, Grammy-Award winning Jazz musician

2013

Edward Helms, renowned actor and comedian
Lisa Madigan, Illinois Attorney General
Lawrence B. Breitborde, Knox College Dean and Vice President for Academic Affairs
Roger L. Taylor '63, 18th President of Knox College*
Anne Taylor '63, retired pro bono counsel for Knox College*

*awarded at 2013 Homecoming Convocation

2012

Brigadier General Mark Martins, Chief Prosecutor of the war crimes trial system reformed by the Military Commissions Act of 2009
Sir Andrew Davis, Music Director and Principal Conductor of Lyric Opera of Chicago
Dr. Joseph S. Francisco, William E. Moore Distinguished Professor of Physical Chemistry at Purdue University

2011

Majora J. Carter, Nationally known eco-entrepreneur
Kate Maehr, chief executive officer of the Greater Chicago Food Depository

2010

Tina Tchen, Director of the White House Office of Public Engagement and the Executive Director of the White House Council on Women and Girls
Kwame Dawes, acclaimed author and artist as well as respected actor, playwright, and broadcaster
Jim Owens, chairman and chief executive officer of Caterpillar Inc., chairman of the Business Council, and member of the Business Roundtable and the President's Economic Recovery Advisory Board

2009

Patrick J. Fitzgerald, U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of Illinois
Garry Wills, renowned cultural historian and author of more than three-dozen books
Bill Geer, noted geneticist who taught biology at Knox College from 1963 until his retirement in 2000

2008

Madeleine Albright, former U.S. Secretary of State
Barry Bearak '71, Knox graduate and New York Times foreign correspondent and winner of the Pulitzer Prize
Alan I Leshner, Chief Executive Officer of the American Association for the Advancement of Science

2007

William Jefferson Clinton, 42nd President of the United States, founder of the William J. Clinton Foundation and the Clinton Global Initiative
Janet McKinley, Chair of Oxfam America
Douglas Wilson, Lincoln scholar and Professor Emeritus of English at Knox College

2006

Stephen Colbert, political satirist and star of The Colbert Report
Shirley Barnes, former U.S. ambassador to Madagascar and activist on human trafficking
Diane B. Smatlak Rosenberg '63, Knox graduate and outgoing chair of the Knox College Board of Trustees
Jimmy Wales, founder of Wikipedia

2005

Barack Obama, U.S. Senator from Illinois
Elizabeth Hayford, president of the Associated Colleges of the Midwest

2004

Lawrence Brilliant, physician, human rights activist and technology pioneer
John W. Dower, scholar of Japanese history

2003

Admiral William J. Crowe Jr., former chairman, Joint Chiefs of Staff
JoAnn M. Burkholder, botanist at North Carolina State University
Martha C. Nussbaum, philosopher and legal scholar at the University of Chicago

2002

Jonathan Fanton, President of the MacArthur Foundation and Chair of Human Rights Watch
Basilio Losada Castro, professor of literature at the University of Barcelona
Clint Grant, retired chief photographer at the Dallas Morning News
Anna Sophia Johnson, community environmental activist
Jane Johnson, community environmental activist

2001

Nancy S. Dye, president of Oberlin College
Dwight R. Crandell '44, Knox graduate and geologist who predicted the Mount St. Helens eruption
Terry Evans, photographer and naturalist
Maury Klein '60, Knox graduate and scholar of economic history

2000

Brian Lamb, founder of C-SPAN
Andrew J. McKenna, Jr., Illinois business and political leader and philanthropist
Cullom Davis, Lincoln scholar
Victoria Post Ranney, developer and conservationist in Illinois

More Honorary Degrees:1900-1999 | 1849-1899

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Printed on Friday, March 31, 2023