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In The News
May 9, 2008
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Talk Show Host Tavis Smiley to
Address
California State University, Dominguez Hills Graduates
(Carson, CA)—National
talk show host, political commentator and author Tavis Smiley will
serve as the keynote speaker at the California State University,
Dominguez Hills (CSUDH) Undergraduate Commencement Ceremony scheduled
to take place at 8 a.m. Friday, May 23, in the Home Depot Center
Soccer Stadium on campus.
Smiley will receive an honorary Doctor of Humane Letters from
the university that morning, as well.
“We are thrilled that Tavis Smiley accepted our invitation
to speak at this year’s undergraduate commencement ceremony,
and we are equally pleased to bestow on him an honorary doctorate,” said
CSUDH President Mildred García. “From the strides
he has made in his career as a broadcaster to his dedication to
youth and commitment to social change, Mr. Smiley is a role model
for our graduates as they go out and make their own mark on society.”
The host of the nightly PBS talk show “Tavis Smiley” and
the weekly radio program “The Tavis Smiley Show” on
Pubic Radio International, and a regular commentator on “The
Tom Joyner Morning Show” radio program, Smiley is one of
the most influential African American broadcast journalists in
the United States today.
The oldest of 10 children, Smiley grew up in Indiana and attended
Indiana University in Bloomington on a debate scholarship. After
graduating with a degree in public and environmental affairs in
1986, he moved to Los Angeles to serve as an aide to then Los Angeles
Mayor Tom Bradley.
His broadcast career began in 1991 when
he produced weekly one-minute news segments called “Tavis Smiley Report” for a Los
Angeles radio station. Five years later the report was added to
Joyner’s show and Smiley expanded his repertoire to television,
producing and hosting “BET Tonight” on Black Entertainment
Television.
Since leaving BET in 2001, he has further
solidified his position as a national commentator and journalist
through his shows on National
Public Radio (until 2004) and now PBS and PRI. Newsweek declared
him one of the nation’s “captains of the airwaves,” and
among the top 20 people “changing how Americans get their
news.”
Smiley is also an author, having written or edited a number of
books on social and economic empowerment, including the Covenant
with Black America, a series of essays by black scholars, activists,
and political figures that became No. 1 on the New York Times Best-Seller
List. He has also written a memoir titled What I Know for Sure:
My Story of Growing Up in America.
Through his celebrity, the Los Angeles resident has worked tirelessly
to give back, particularly to the black community. For the past
nine years his Tavis Smiley Foundation has worked with more than
5,000 black youth, helping them develop their leadership skills
and in the process empowering them to reach their potential. His
philanthropy has also contributed to ongoing scholarships for black
students and the establishment of schools for communications and
professional media studies at Texas Southern University.
Smiley will address approximately 1,500
bachelor’s degree
candidates walking in the 2008 Commencement Ceremony on May 23.
The ceremony will be webcast live through a link on the commencement
web site, www.csudh.edu/commencement.
Located in the South Bay region of Los Angeles County, CSU Dominguez
Hills is considered by US News and World Report to be one of the
most diverse campuses on the West Coast. With a student population
of 12,000, no one ethnicity is in the majority; the student make-up
is 39.7% Hispanic, 31.1 African American, 18.2 white, 10.6 Asian,
and .04 American Indian.
CSU Dominguez Hills offers 45 bachelor
degrees and 21 master’s
degrees in its six colleges: College of Education, College of Business
Administration and Public Policy, College of Arts and Humanities,
College of Health and Human Services, College of Natural and Behavioral
Sciences, and College of Extended and International Education.
It is recognized for its excellence in teacher education, business
administration, nursing, psychology and digital media arts. For
more information, visit www.csudh.edu.
A commencement ceremony
for master’s degree candidates will
take place on Thursday May, 22, at 7 p.m. at the Home Depot Center
Tennis Stadium. At that ceremony California Assemblyman Warren
Furutani (D-55th) will give the keynote address, and Mónica
Lazano, publisher of La Opinion, the largest Spanish-language newspaper
in the country and the second largest paper in Los Angeles, will
receive an honorary Doctor of Humane Letters.
# # #
---------------------------------------------- About
CSU Dominguez Hills -- California
State University, Dominguez Hills is a highly diverse,
urban university located in the South Bay, primarily
serving the
Los Angeles metropolitan area. The university prides itself
on its outstanding faculty and friendly, student-centered
environment.
Known for excellence in teacher education, nursing, psychology,
business administration, and digital media arts, new degree
programs include computer science, criminal justice,
recreation and leisure
studies, social work, and communication disorders. On campus
is the Home Depot Center, a multi-purpose sports complex
that hosts
world-class soccer, tennis, track and field, lacrosse, and
cycling.
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