In contrast to the primarily virtual graduation ceremonies of the COVID-19 era, this year many top law schools in the U.S. are resuming in-person events, accompanied by high-profile speakers. This follows several years of virtual-only graduations imposed by pandemic restrictions. The return to in-person events is marked by the participation of significant figures in the legal and corporate worlds.
Above the Law is tracking the list of keynote speakers at law school graduation ceremonies. Help from the public is sought to keep the list up-to-date, by reaching out via email to provide updates on confirmed speakers at various law schools.
Big names that have been confirmed as commencement speakers for this year’s graduation ceremonies at U.S. News T14 law schools include:
- Christopher H. Schroeder, former head of the Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel, at Duke
- Adam Liptak, legal correspondent for the New York Times, at Penn
- Dasha Smith, vice president and chief administrative officer for the NFL, at UVA
- Kristen Clarke, U.S. Assistant Attorney General, head of the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division, at Columbia
- Vijaya Gadde, former chief legal officer and head of compliance, policy, trust and safety at Twitter, at NYU
- Judge Jeffrey Cummings of the Northern District of Illinois, at Northwestern
- Michele Roberts, executive director of the National Basketball Players Association, at UC Berkeley
- Mariano-Florentino (Tino) Cuéllar, president of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, former Justice of the Supreme Court of California, at UCLA
Additionally, several other notable figures have been reported to speak at other law school’s ceremonies, such as Judge Tamika Montgomery-Reeves of the Third Circuit at Georgia, Mary Smith, president of the American Bar Association at Seattle, and Kathi Vidal, Under Secretary of Commerce for Intellectual Property and Director of the US Patent and Trademark Office at UNH-Franklin Pierce.
Your contributions are solicited to help keep the list comprehensive and current. To share details about speakers at upcoming law school graduations, please send an email to Above the Law.