Drexel Announces 2015 Honorary Degree Recipients

Drexel University will award 15 honorary degrees to prominent individuals distinguished in their fields at this year's commencement. The honorary degree recipients include tennis legend and activist Billie Jean King, MIT Professor Emeritus and linguistics expert Noam Chomsky, 2011 Nobel Prize winner Dan Shechtman and Philadelphia Police Commissioner Charles Ramsey. 

Twelve of the recipients will receive their honorary degree at seven separate ceremonies held from June 11 to 13 at Drexel’s John A. Daskalakis Athletic Center (33rd and Market Streets). Ceremonies will be webcast live at www.drexel.edu/commencement. Commencement for Drexel's College of Medicine and Kline School of Law were held in May.

The full list of recipients honored at Drexel's 128th Commencement follows (the asterisk indicates a speaker):

Thursday, June 11

Ceremony for all doctoral candidates (2 p.m.):

*Warner Greene: Director, senior investigator, and Nick and Sue Hellmann Distinguished Processor of Translational Medicine at the Gladstone Institute of Virology and Immunology (University of California - San Francisco).

Friday, June 12

Ceremony for master’s graduates in the Westphal College of Media Arts & Design, School of Education, LeBow College of Business and Goodwin College of Professional Studies (10 a.m.):

*Noam Chomsky: Professor emeritus at MIT, linguist, philosopher, cognitive scientist, logician and political commentator.

Charles Ramsey: Commissioner of the Philadelphia Police Department.

Ceremony for bachelor's graduates in the School of Education, Center for Hospitality and Sports Management, LeBow College of Business and Goodwin College of Professional Studies (2 p.m.):

*Billie Jean King: Tennis legend, gender equality champion and founder of the Billie Jean King Leadership Initiative. 

James Marks, ’47, ’49: President of Marks & Company, real estate business leader and Drexel emeritus trustee.

Saturday, June 13

Ceremony for master's graduates in the College of Arts and Sciences, College of Computing & Informatics, Center for Hospitality and Sports Management, School of Public Health, College of Engineering and School of Biomedical Engineering, Science, and Health Systems (8:30 a.m.):

*Jonathan Fielding: Former Director of the Los Angeles County Department of Public Health and professor of health policy and management, and pediatrics at the UCLA Fielding School of Public Health.

Ceremony for bachelor's graduates in the College of Engineering, School of Biomedical Engineering, Science and Health Systems and College of Computing & Informatics (12 p.m.):

*Dan Shechtman: Winner of the 2011 Nobel Prize in chemistry, Philip Tobias Professor of Materials Science at the Technion – Israel Institute of Technology and professor of materials science at Iowa State University.  

Ted Hoff: Co-inventor of the first microprocessor.

Ceremony for master's, bachelor's and associate's graduates in the College of Nursing and Health Professions (3:30 p.m.):

*Christine Grady: Chief of the Clinical Center's Department of Bioethics, National Institutes of Health.

Ceremony for bachelor's graduates in the Westphal College of Media Arts & Design, College of Arts and Sciences and Pennoni Honors College (Custom Design Majors) (7 p.m.):

*Ralph Rucci: Acclaimed Philadelphia-born fashion designer.

Howard Benson, ’80: Grammy-nominated music producer.

Mark Greenberg: Provost emeritus and founding dean of the Pennoni Honors College at Drexel University