Commencement planned for May 12 and 13

A Nashville music producer, head of C-SPAN, and CEO and chairman of the National Geographic Society will be among those taking part in the University’s commencement exercises May 12 and 13.

At least five Korean War-era veterans whose educations were interrupted by the war and who did not return to the University will receive honorary bachelor of letters degrees May 13.

Approximately 756 baccalaureate degrees and 70 graduate degrees will be awarded May 13 at 2 p.m. in the Robins Center.

Commencement ceremonies for the School of Continuing Studies and Richmond School of Law will take place May 12 in the Robins Center at 9 a.m. and 2 p.m., respectively. The law school will award 144 J.D. degrees, and SCS will present 135 bachelor’s, associate’s and master’s degrees.

Steve Buckingham, R’71, will be the alumni speaker May 13. Student speakers for baccalaureate, the candlelight ceremony and commencement will be selected in April.

Robin Starr, chief executive officer of the Richmond SPCA, will speak at the law school commencement. A speaker for the SCS ceremony will be announced later.

Six people will receive honorary doctorate degrees May 13: Dr. Alfred H. Bloom, president of Swarthmore College, doctor of laws; John Fahey, president, CEO and chairman of the National Geographic Society, doctor of science; Dr. William E. Cooper, president of University of Richmond, doctor of science; Brian Lamb, president and CEO of C-SPAN, doctor of letters; Jorge Ramos, news anchor, Noticiero Univision, Univision Communications, doctor of letters; and Lila Harnett, co-founder of The Harnett Print Study Center and founder of ArtTable, doctor of fine arts.

Also, Otis D. Coston Jr., president of Stonemark Corp. and former rector of the University of Richmond Board of Trustees, will receive the Trustees’ Distinguished Service Award, presented in recognition of unselfish dedication and meritorious service to the University.

Buckingham is a four-time Grammy Award-winning producer, with 27 number one singles to his credit. He has received 11 Platinum and 19 Gold albums. The special relationship that he develops with artists, musicians and songwriters has yielded top 10 singles on 11 different charts. Among the varied artists he has produced are Dolly Parton, Linda Ronstadt, Tammy Wynette, The Chieftains, Sinéad O’Connor, Mary Chapin Carpenter, Ricky Skaggs, Dionne Warwick, Loretta Lynn, jazz artists Kirk Whalum and Martin Taylor and many others. He also has produced music for six motion pictures and two CBS television specials. For 10 years, Buckingham was vice president of A&R for Columbia Records before moving to his current position as senior vice president of Vanguard and Sugar Hill Records.

Starr is a graduate of Wake Forest University and Richmond School of Law, where she was editor of University of Richmond Law Review. She practiced corporate law as an in-house attorney with A.H. Robins Co. and, subsequently, with Williams Mullen law firm, where she was a partner in the business and corporate law section. She left the practice of law in 1997 to become CEO of the Richmond SPCA. She worked with the organization’s board to lead its transformation to a no-kill community and to create a new humane center with an on-site spay-neuter clinic and educational facilities.

In recognition of her contributions to fulfilling the vision, the Robins-Starr Humane Center bears her name along with that of E. Claiborne Robins Jr., chair of the capital campaign and former board chair.

Bloom became president of Swarthmore College in 1991. Formerly a member of the college’s faculty, he also served as associate provost, director of the Linguistics Program, coordinator of a comprehensive review and restructuring of the educational program and coordinator of Asian Studies. His return to Swarthmore followed five years at Pitzer College as dean of faculty, vice president for academic affairs and executive vice president. He is author of The Linguistic Shaping of Thought: A Study of the Impact of Language and Thinking in China and the West and Moral Behavior in Chinese Society.

Fahey is president and CEO of the National Geographic Society and chair of its board’s executive committee. Founded in 1888, the society is one of the largest nonprofit scientific and educational organizations in the world, reaching more than 350 million people each month through five magazines, the National Geographic Channel, television documentaries, films, radio, books, videos, maps and interactive media. Fahey joined the society in 1996 as the first president and CEO of National Geographic Ventures, the society’s separate, wholly owned, taxable subsidiary. Fahey has led an evolution of the society, including its entry into cable television and the international expansion of National Geographic magazine. Formerly, he was chair, president and CEO of Time Life Inc.

Lamb is CEO of C-SPAN, the nation’s eighth largest cable network. He has been at the helm of the public affairs channel since he helped launch it in 1979. Today, C-SPAN delivers public affairs programming on three television channels to most of the nation’s cable and satellite customers, globally to Internet users via C-SPAN.org and to radio listeners through C-SPAN radio. Also an on-air regular, Lamb has interviewed six U.S. presidents and world leaders such as Margaret Thatcher and Mikhail Gorbachev. Once a week, he hosts Washington Journal and Q and A. Over 15 years, beginning in 1989, he interviewed 800 non-fiction authors for a weekly program known as Booknotes.

Ramos has been called “Star newscaster of Hispanic TV” and “Hispanic TV’s No. 1 correspondent and key to a huge voting bloc” by The Wall Street Journal. Time magazine included him in the list of the 25 most influential Hispanics in the United States and Latino Leaders magazine chose him in 2004 as one of “The Ten Most Admired Latinos.” Ramos has been anchor for Noticiero Univision since 1986. Among his many recognitions are eight Emmy awards for excellence in journalism. He writes a weekly column for more than 40 newspapers in the United States and Latin America, provides daily radio commentary to dozens of radio stations, collaborates with one of the largest  Spanish-language Web sites in the world and is author of seven books.

Harnett has been a journalist since 1953 and a collector of American art since 1951. She is the founder of ArtTable, a national organization of some 1,600 professional women leaders in the arts, now in its 27th year. She began her career by establishing a successful newsletter devoted to business applications of atomic energy. After selling the publication, she became a cultural affairs correspondent and syndicated columnist for New York state newspapers. After 10 years, she became art critic for CUE magazine in New York City. In 1983, she was named to the New York State Council on the Arts, where she served for eight years and chaired the Museum Committee. Along with her husband, the late Joel Harnett, she founded and co-published Phoenix Home & Garden, Arizona’s leading magazine and the most successful regional home and garden publication in the country. She served as the magazine’s editor and as publisher and editor of Scottsdale Scene, which was added to their roster of magazines. She and Joel endowed the Harnett Print Study Center at University of Richmond, and in 2005, the Richmond campus art museum was named for the Harnetts.

Coston is president of Stonemark Corp., a real estate investment firm. He is a University of Richmond trustee, formerly serving as rector of the board. His many community activities include serving as past chair of the board of the Guardian Foundation (United Methodist Family Services), past board chair of the George Mason University Foundation, and trustee and treasurer of the George Mason University Instructional Foundation. He is a board member of Wesley Theological Seminary Foundation and INOVA Health System Foundation. He holds a B.S. from Oklahoma University and an M.B.A. from Harvard Graduate School of Business Administration.